It would be anti-competitive and unfair to make pay-TV licensees carry SABC content and not its own, says free-to-air channel e.tv.
The broadcaster has made written submissions, along with all the newly-appointed pay-TV operators, to the Independent Communications Authority of SA (ICASA) about the must-carry obligation under the Electronic Communications Act. These submissions will discussed in December by the various stakeholders.
"Must-carry" refers to the obligation for pay-TV operators to carry public service television content in the interest of universal access and accessibility. However, ICASA still has to determine how much of the content has to be carried, which content it should be, and the cost implications of the obligation.
In its written submission, e.tv says it has greater public service obligations, at 45% of local content, than the SABC, at 35%.
"If the driving principle behind must-carry is one of universal access to pubic service programming, then e.tv merits the same status as the SABC as a broadcaster with significant public service obligations."
To strengthen its argument, e.tv quotes international examples where privately-owned televisions stations in the UK, because of their size, are referred to as public broadcasters. In this context, it says, it should be considered a public broadcaster.
Furthermore, e.tv says its content should be carried under the must-carry principle as 80% of the SABC`s income is generated by commercial activities, unlike public broadcasters in other countries.
"E.tv already operates in an uncompetitive market where the SABC has access to multiple sources of revenue, while e.tv is solely reliant on advertising and has greater public service obligations than SABC3," the channel states.
"If e.tv is not granted must-carry status along with the SABC channels, this will aggravate the existing unfair competitive environment."
Other sources of income
Most of the other pay-tv licensees indicated must-carry obligations would impact negatively on their cost base.
On Digital Media stated in its submission "the net cost of carriage will be passed onto subscribers", something that more than one submission identified as unfair, since the public already pays licence fees for the SABC`s content.
In its submission, Telkom Media said: "It is undesirable to expect the subscribers to pay twice for [SABC] programming since they are already contributing towards the public broadcaster."
The company also says: "New subscription services would have no option but to at least partially recuperate costs (for must-carry content) from subscribers, which could negatively affect the capacity of new operators to compete with an established player."
Most of the new licensees were willing to consider carrying the SABC`s non-commercial stations (SABC1 and SABC2). However, Walking on Water TV submitted that niche players should be exempt from such obligations "because carrying such programmes would nullify our existence due to the contrary nature of these programmes from who we are [a Christian television station]".
Walking on Water submitted that such exemptions should not be related to the size of the subscription service as "our market and size is bound to change, but Him [Jesus Christ] whom we represent will never change".
Oral submissions on the must-carry provision are to be heard on 11 and 12 December.
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