Communications minister Khumbudzo Ntshavheni. Image: GCIS

Communications minister Khumbudzo Ntshavheni has set a new planned analogue switch-off date for terrestrial television broadcasting services in South Africa: 31 March 2023.

Whether this new date will again be challenged in court by broadcasting players remains to be seen, but the minister declared on Friday that enough has now been done to ensure set-top boxes are rolled out to indigent households under a government subsidy scheme.

Read the minister’s full statement here

The minister’s new analogue switch-off (ASO) date comes a year after she had originally wanted to terminate analogue terrestrial broadcasts in South Africa and is eight years beyond the date the country committed to the International Telecommunication Union, an agency of the United Nations, to get the job done.

The migration from analogue to digital TV is a critical component of ensuring mobile operators get access to spectrum suitable for deploying broadband services.

Ntshavheni earlier this year lost a high-stakes battle in the constitutional court with free-to-air broadcaster e.tv over her plans to conclude ASO. The country’s apex court set aside a decision by the high court that analogue broadcasts could be switched off by end-June.

The constitutional court ruled that the minister had to consult with affected industry players before she could set a new date for ASO, something she promised she would do.

‘Ignored’

On Friday, Ntshavheni said she has written to affected industry stakeholders advising them about the new switch-off date and asked them to provide input on the decision by no later than 27 January. The minister said her department expects to conclude the installation of the remaining set-top boxes in indigent households within the next three months.

Asked for comment on the minister’s latest ASO date, e.tv CEO Khalik Sherrif told TechCentral that the company is “rather alarmed at how out of kilter the minister is with what is really happening on the ground”.

“She is also out of kilter with the stakeholders that discuss this matter on a regular basis,” Sherrif said. “We have provided research to the minister on what is really happening on the ground, and that has been ignored.”