The 6th Annual South African Film and Television Awards (SAFTAS) held at Gallagher Estate in Midrand on 9 and 10 March had to weather a last minute storm due to free-to-air broadcaster e.tv’s withdrawal of its shows from the competition, as well as removing presenter participation from the ceremonies.
Zama Mkosi, newly appointed CEO of the National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF) – the custodian of the SAFTAS – comments: “Both the SAFTAS Fiction and Non-Fiction ceremonies went well. The community was pleased with the outstanding creative input behind the staging of this year’s production.
“In general no negative publicity was received. However, there was a mention of e.tv indicating that it was not happy with the SAFTAS going ahead with announcing the channel’s winners.’
Mkosi stresses that the NFVF does not believe any damage was done to the SAFTAS reputation. “We would like to emphasise that the SAFTAS needs all industry stakeholders, including all the broadcasters, to ensure that all South African talent is recognised, regardless of which channel their work is being broadcast on, to make the SAFTAS the premier film awards in the country.’
In the statement released by e.tv on 5 March, head of Channels Monde Twala said: “We have tried to address our concerns on numerous occasions in the last two years with the SAFTAS committee and through the NFVF representatives. The credibility of the SAFTAS should be a priority and therefore there is a greater need for transparency, fairness, a particularly well outlined judging process and formalised structure. Some critical decisions are made outside the involvement of committee members, hence our effort to achieve a structured committee that has clear objectives and takes full accountability for the process.’
Zama responds: “As we have indicated in previous comments, all the broadcasters are required to express their dissatisfaction or concern during the SAFTAS committee meetings. At the time e.tv released its statement, the committee was unaware of any dissatisfaction.
“The committee comprises all stakeholders including the broadcasters. During the interactions, the e.tv representative, who was present at the meetings and copied on all communication, was always aware of all matters discussed but never uttered any dissatisfaction.’
Screen Africa received this comment from Twala in response: “The e.tv channel has consulted with all its stakeholders internally on the matter – this includes production companies, cast and crews who work closely with us. Our concerns about the SAFTAS are industry-wide issues and we need to promote excellence across the various disciplines in the industry. We believe we can achieve this if we work together openly.’
7de Laan
When the SAFTAS nominations were announced on 16 February, the press highlighted that two-time previous winner of the SAFTAS Best Soap category, 7de Laan, chose not to enter the competition and was thus not eligible for the public vote which decides the winner of this category.
Said 7de Laan line producer Colin Howard: “It wasn’t our intention to grandstand or publicly boycott the SAFTAS. We just felt that, given what we felt were shortcomings in the process, we wouldn’t participate. Of course the popular press ran with the story.
“However, we were unaware that we would not be eligible for the public vote for Best Soap. The judging process is handed over to the public, then why not the nomination process?’
According to Zama, it will still be a requirement in all future SAFTAS competitions that an official submission must be made for projects to be eligible for nominations. “The rules state that for all projects or programmes to be eligible for SAFTAS entry, they should be submitted to the NFVF before the closing date. 7de Laan did not submit any entries.’
Regarding their rationale for not entering the 2012 competition, Howard stresses that the 7de Laan producers had mentioned their concerns to the SAFTAS committee previously.
“We believe the performance judging panel should be made up of peers, preferably with soap experience. There also needs to be sufficient representation of all the languages soaps are broadcast in on the panel. Finally, rather than requesting episodes, producers should be able to submit compilations of scenes (as soaps are a continuous, daily body of work), showcasing their best work, for each entrant. And of course the panel needs to be as impartial as possible.
“In other SAFTAS categories there are awards for wardrobe, directing, set design, writing etc. Yet the SAFTAS will only consider these in the soap category if specially motivated. I don’t understand why the SAFTAS makes exceptions of the creative people working for soaps,’ explains Howard.
He stresses that awards like the SAFTAS have an important role in promoting the local industry. “However, if the major players in the industry are not part of the awards, everyone is cheated and even the achievements of the winners are diminished, which is unfortunate.’
At the moment the SAFTAS is fully funded by the NFVF – an arrangement that was never meant to be a long term.
Zama concludes: “The NFVF is excited about the future of the SAFTAS and we would like to call upon all the stakeholders and business to invest in the awards. We are investigating the viability of establishing an independent Academy to run the SAFTAS.’
Screen Africa magazine- May 2012
