SABC showing eight Africa Cup of Nations matches live
SABC gives fans the middle finger
Posted: 2012-01-19 13:37
The SABC do not have to care about soccer fans, but it would be nice if they at least pretended to.
The national broadcaster, the 'home of soccer', will only show eight of the 32 Africa Cup of Nations matches live. The rest of them will be delayed live.
SABC spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago has informed the New Age that the decision was made because soap operas are more profitable than soccer, a statement both incontestable and infuriatingly flippant.
"80 percent of our revenue comes from advertisements and soapies like Generations make more money than football," Kganyago told the New Age's Patrick Baloyi. "The games are taking place during prime-time and, as a national broadcaster that received only three percent from the government, the decision was based on a scheduling issue."
In September the SABC reported that it had made "significant progress towards reaching an agreement [with SportFive] for the TV rights to broadcast the Africa Cup of Nations matches until 2016" – but now it turns out most of them will be "delayed live", which we all know does not actually exist.
"We are not short-changing the soccer fraternity, but also looking at what brings in more revenue, because we are accountable in making a profit," Kganyago says, although to be honest the SABC is short-changing the soccer fraternity.
SportFive are notorious around the continent for overcharging skint African countries, and deliberately leaving the negotiations dangerously late to force national broadcasters' hands. Why SportFive, a French company, holds CAF's television rights is a mystery that will probably never be solved, although allegations of nepotism permeate the relationship, and, well, Issa Hayatou was in charge when the deal was done.
However, the SABC's treatment of the South African public is disrespectful and frustrating.
For the match against Egypt in June last year, the announcement that it would be live was made shortly before kick-off. That was the game the SABC begrudgingly paid R5-million to broadcast, setting a benchmark of payment they were apparently unwilling to meet again.
But the Niger match on September 4 was the beginning of the joke. The SABC kept us all in suspense until about 20 minutes before the game, when it announced with great fanfare that the match would be shown live. Great excitement and relief. But the feed never arrived, and fans were left watching analysts shoot the breeze for what seemed like hours. What was worse was that they did not even update viewers with the score, or give any indication of how the match was progressing. Fans had to resort to Twitter and Facebook to find out Bafana were losing.
The Sierra Leone match is undoubtedly the low point in South African soccer – let's hope it doesn't get any worse. But perhaps the most mortifying part to witness – as a journalist – was the SABC presenters informing us – and a confused Pitso Mosimane – that Bafana had qualified for the Afcon. Sure, they were just following the technical team's lead, but the national broadcaster should aspire to higher levels of journalistic professionalism. The SABC were so confident that we had gone through that they even confused the wise soccer gurus at KickOff.com for a few seconds.
Then there was the friendly against Zimbabwe on November 15, which the SABC told us they would show live, before changing that to "delayed live" on the day, owing to "technical problems". When the match was shown at last it looked like it was being filmed on a resourceful fan's cellphone – to be fair, a situation probably beyond the SABC's control.
The match against Equatorial Guinea was also not shown live, as the kick-off time was changed the day before at the request of the Equatoguinean president. But the media knew about this long before the SABC – in fact it was KickOff.com that broke the news to Kganyago. The new kick-off time, 8.30pm, clashed with the untouchable soapie Generations. How a soap opera is priorised, unapologetically, over the exploits of the national soccer team, KickOff.com just cannot comprehend.
The SABC also decided not to broadcast the matches against Zambia and Ghana, after they were downgraded to practice matches. But surely the second most important reason Bafana play friendlies – after the aim of improving as a team – is to entertain the country?
Whether or not any or all of these situations were the SABC's fault, it is unnacceptable that fans are given information that turns out to be false, and yanked from jubilation to disappointment as the situation unfolds. We demand to be told the truth. It is pointless to give us good news to placate us, if the sad reality hits us a few hours later. That just makes us much more angry than we would have been if we were told from the start: the match will not be shown.
The New Age alleges that SportFive again demanded too much money from the SABC, and Kganyago's response to this allegation is quite simply bizarre.
"We are free-to-air television and we cannot just throw money away, but that does not mean that we didn't buy the rights to screen 32 matches," he said, ingeniously deploying the double negative to create confusion, while cryptically suggesting that the SABC both did and did not buy the television rights.
"The matches will be screened live, but delayed, as we have to strike a balance for other viewers who don't follow soccer," Kganyago concluded, yet again evoking the infamous SABC paradox that "live" can be anything other than live.
Do you agree or disagree? Tell me so on Twitter @ProjectJennifer
: 2012-01-19 13:48
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