Communications Minister Yunus Carrim has accused MultiChoice and its partners of trotting out the “same old, tired issues’ over digital terrestrial television and labelled the pay-television broadcaster a bullying “monopoly’ in an article that appeared on TechCentral.
Carrim’s reaction was triggered by MultiChoice and two industry associations, the National Association of Manufacturers in Electronic Components and the Association of Community Television South Africa, which accused him of advancing the “the narrow commercial interests’ of “certain’ players, clearly referring to free-to-air broadcaster e.tv, in full-page Sunday newspaper advertisements.
A high-stakes battle has been raging between MultiChoice and e.tv over whether the set-top boxes that consumers will require to watch digital television when South Africa switches off analogue broadcasts should contain a control system based on encryption technology.
Carrim told TechCentral that the MultiChoice advert was “astonishingly inaccurate and serves to substantially weaken the case of those opposed to the government’s policy’.
He continued by saying that at the heart of the dispute are the fears of a huge monopoly about competition. “It’s 20 years into our democracy and we have to de-racialise the economy. In all economic spheres where monopolies are challenged in our country, they resist fiercely. We can’t be constantly bullied. It is absurd that a monopoly that makes such huge profits in this country claims that it, not the ANC government, represents the country’s interests,’ Carrim added.
Carrim emphasised that the policy was not his personal, subjective decision, but that Cabinet had adopted it in 2008. He stated that Cabinet had adjusted the policy so that broadcasters should be free to decide whether to use the control system in the set-top boxes or not. The Minister added that the boxes would have a control system for industrial policy and other reasons and that those using the system would pay for it.
According to Carrim, communications regulator ICASA fully supports the policy on set-top box control. He added that if control is dropped, the roll-out would be delayed by a year – an initiative that should have launched in September 2008.
Carrim cited that many other countries, such as Zambia, Uganda, Botswana, Ethiopia, the Seychelles, Malawi, Nigeria, Namibia, Tanzania, Kenya, Malaysia Ukraine, Belarus and Slovakia are using the same system, or are about to.
