South Africa may have a new minister of communications, the Democratic Alliance’s Solly Malatsi, but the latest development in the digital TV migration saga still feels a bit like Groundhog Day.
TechCentral has learnt that free-to-air broadcaster e.tv has filed an urgent application at the high court in Pretoria seeking to stop Malatsi from switching off analogue broadcasts on 31 March 2025 as planned.
“This is an urgent application for an interim interdict preventing the minister from switching off analogue broadcasting on 31 March,” said e.tv executive director Antonio Lee in the broadcaster’s founding affidavit, which TechCentral has read. The papers were filed on 24 January.
“Around 12 million people are reliant on analogue signals to receive television broadcasts because they cannot afford satellite or other forms of digital broadcasting. The analogue switch-off – if not postponed – will leave millions of people without access to television,” Lee said.
E.tv is the first applicant, while media watchdogs Media Monitoring Africa and SOS Support Public Broadcasting Coalition are listed in the court papers as the second and third applicants. Apart from Malatsi, respondents include President Cyril Ramaphosa, broadcast signal distributor Sentech, communications regulator Icasa, the SABC and number of regional community TV stations.
Lee said in his affidavit that switching off analogue broadcasts at the end of March will break a promise made by government that it will “leave no one behind” in the migration to digital broadcasting.
Litigious
Lee further argued that government’s roll-out of subsidised set-top boxes to indigent households is a shambles. According to e.tv, the state has failed to supply these devices to the 450 000 households that applied for the programme. “These indigent households will have their television cut off, despite being eligible and duly registered for a set-top box,” he said. According to Sentech, it still has 220 000 boxes to install and just two months in which to do it.
This is not the first time e.tv – or its parent, eMedia – has taken a communications minister to court over the analogue switch-off. The constitutional court in 2022 ruled in favour of e.tv and others, finding that former communications minister Khumbudzo Ntshavheni had failed to consult with industry stakeholders including e.tv, Media Monitoring Africa and others before deciding to set a date for switching off analogue broadcasts.
Read: E.tv in stunning victory over minister in digital TV fight
The court found Ntshavheni’ s lack of consultation was unlawful and slammed her ministry’s lethargic approach to the registration and distribution of set-top boxes. Ntshavheni’s unilateral decision to set a deadline for set-top-box registrations was described as “irrational”.
Lee said in his affidavit that Malatsi was guilty of making the same mistake as Ntshavheni: not consulting industry stakeholders before setting the 31 March deadline.
This is not the first time that e.tv and eMedia have voiced concerns regarding the fallout that might follow the termination of analogue broadcasts in South Africa.
At Icasa hearings last June, eMedia CEO Khaliq Sherrif slammed the communications ministry’s previous 31 December deadline, labelling it “premature”.
In his presentation to a panel of Icasa councillors, Sherrif said it was unlikely that the millions of households that still could not access digital broadcasts – mainly because they didn’t have the necessary hardware – would be connected by 31 December. This prediction turned out to be true.
Lee said free-to-air broadcasters such as e.tv and the SABC face “irreparable harm” should the analogue switch-off go ahead.
E.tv has asked the court to set the 31 March deadline aside while a review of the decision is pending. It has also argued that the potential for harm is grounds for the court to hear the matter on an urgent basis.
“The analogue switch-off deadline is on 31 March 2025. Any hearing after that date cannot afford the applicants or millions of indigent viewers effective relief,” said Lee.
Minister Malatsi’s spokesman, Kwena Moloto, could not immediately be reached on his mobile phone for comment. – © 2025 NewsCentral Media
Get breaking news from TechCentral on WhatsApp. Sign up here.