Migration from analogue to digital terrestrial television is on track, communications minister Khumbudo Ntshavheni said, even as industry insiders express doubt.
Browsing: Sentech
Communications minister Khumbudzo Ntshavheni has drawn a line in the sand, saying the switch-off of analogue television broadcasts in South Africa will happen by the end of March.
The SABC’s fight with Sentech over tariffs is going from a skirmish to a full-blown public confrontation. The stakes couldn’t be higher – for both sides.
The SABC and eMedia Investments have inked a channel carriage agreement that will see the public broadcaster supplying Openview with six television channels – SABC 1, 2 and 3 and three new channels.
Broadcasters, working with the ministry of communications & digital technologies, have begun switching off analogue terrestrial television transmitters in the Free State.
The SABC wants a government proposal that it be required to distribute its television programming exclusively through Sentech scrapped, warning that it’s already being disadvantaged by “monopoly” pricing.
I let out a cynical laugh while watching President Cyril Ramaphosa deliver his state of the nation address in parliament on Thursday evening. By Duncan McLeod.
The department of communications & digital technologies has embarked on a process to merge some of its entities in line with a plan to rationalise state entities.
The SABC has told parliament that it simply cannot afford to pay Sentech’s “prohibitive” fees for broadcast signal distribution and that these fees must be cut in half with immediate effect.
Communications minister Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams said on Tuesday that government is pressing ahead with a plan to merge state-owned enterprises Broadband Infraco and Sentech to form a state infrastructure company.