Afro Worldview staff, formerly ANN7 out in the cold as channel shuts down
Employees have been told to stay at home and promised their July salaries.
Mzwanele Manyi, the owner of the Gupta-linked ANN7 television news channel and The New Age newspaper. Facebook/ANN7
Mzwanele Manyi’s Afro Worldview, formerly known as ANN7, had its last broadcast last night.
Employees were told to not come back to work and promised their July salaries.
This comes after satellite television company Multichoice did not renew the channel’s contract on its DSTV platform after it came to an end.
Over the weekend, Manyi took to Twitter asking South Africans to pray for his employees but it seems the prayers didn’t reach the desired destination.
The Citizen earlier reported that Multichoice was still in the process of selecting a new company to fill the Afro Worldview slot.
The channel’s closure comes a few weeks after Manyi’s daily newspaper, Afro Voice, formerly known as The New Age, filed for liquidation.
The newspaper closed abruptly on June 28, sending panic among its employees. The employees claimed they were only told on the day not to come back the following week as the newspaper was shutting down and they would only receive salaries for July.
The newspaper was launched in 2010 and the channel came later in 2013.
Both were owned by the controversial Gupta family.
The media platforms came under heavy scrutiny after allegations of corruption emerged against the family which has close ties to influential political leaders.
Manyi admitted in court papers for liquidation that revenue deteriorated severely after the Zuma administration.
He bought the channel and newspaper from the Gupta family last year.
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