Parliament’s communications & digital technologies committee will write to finance minister Enoch Godongwana seeking R120m to help the cash-strapped SABC cover the local government elections.
The elections are due to take place between November and January next year.
The appeal will be made ahead of the 2025/26 budget, which Godongwana will table in parliament on February 25.
Acting committee chairperson Imraan Subrathie stressed the need for the SABC to receive the money as soon as possible so that it could start planning for coverage of the elections.
SABC CFO Tendai Matore told MPs in a presentation on the public broadcaster’s performance for the first and second quarters of 2025 that it had unsuccessfully applied to the government for R120m.
“Without funding we have no capacity or resources to provide adequate coverage of the elections,” Matore said. “Given where we are with our financial resources, we are unable to accommodate the coverage that is necessary across the provinces and the languages and the infrastructure required without any kind of support.”
Additional allocations
Communications & digital technologies minister Solly Malatsi said conversations are taking place with the National Treasury on providing funding for the SABC to cover the elections. In the past there has always been additional allocations during years of elections, and he hopes it will be forthcoming this year.
SABC group CEO Nomsa Chabeli added that it is important for the public broadcaster to provide a platform for the plurality of voices participating in the elections as well as to educate the population about them.
It has been informed by the Electoral Commission of SA (IEC) that about 400 political parties will contest the elections, which would require wall-to-wall coverage countrywide.
Infrastructure will have to be upgraded and additional staff employed. IEC guidelines will determine how much airtime is allocated to political parties and candidates.
The SABC will receive an allocation from the IEC, largely for election education.
SABC chairperson Khathu Ramukumba highlighted the urgent need to resolve the broadcaster’s long-term funding model.
Malatsi has tasked BMI TechKnowledge Group with designing a funding model for the SABC, which has had to fulfil its public mandate without adequate funding.
Ramukumba said capital markets are reluctant to make long-term commitments while the SABC’s viability remains uncertain.
Matare told MPs the broadcaster is raising R310m on capital markets for infrastructure investment, with R1.4bn more in the pipeline.
Risk of broadcast blackouts
MPs were told that any change to the funding model would require legislative changes, which could take years. Ramukumba warned that the need for refurbishing the broadcaster’s infrastructure was so dire that it could not wait, as there is a risk of a blackout at some stations.
About R4bn is needed for infrastructure investment, MPs were told.
In the first quarter of the 2025/26 year, the SABC made a net loss of R200m, and in the second quarter, a net loss of R156m. In the 2024/25 financial year the net loss was R253.3m compared with R197.8m in the previous year.
The committee was also briefed by executives of Postbank, the growth of which has been hampered by the lack of a fully fledged banking licence, and by a business rescue practitioner of the SA Post Office (Sapo), Anoosh Rooplal.
Postbank made a profit of R70m to end-September 2025, compared with the after-tax income of R124.5m in the same period in 2024, while Sapo made a loss of R87m, including the R183m received under the temporary employer/employee relief scheme (Ters). Excluding this allocation, the net loss was R270m.
Rooplal said the about 100 submissions in response to Malatsi’s request for information about potential private sector partnerships with Sapo are being evaluated.
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