Outa calls on MultiChoice to ‘come clean’ on ANN7 payments

The Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) has urged MultiChoice to come clean about its questionable payments to ANN7.

MultiChoice reportedly made a questionable payment of R25 million to the Guptas’ controversial news channel ANN7, according to information revealed in the latest #GuptaLeaks.

According to Outa CEO Wayne Duvenage, MultiChoice was attempting to hide behind confidentiality clauses and telling “half-truths”. He called on the pay-TV company to come forth with all the facts regarding its transactions with ANN7.

The payments are said to have happened after the Gupta family apparently helped former communications minister Faith Muthambi in getting President Jacob Zuma to transfer certain broadcasting powers to her, which MultiChoice reportedly was lobbying the minister for.

“It would appear that not only did the Guptas get what they wanted in the launch of their own news channel ANN7‚ which was rewarded with lucrative annual payments from MultiChoice to the tune of R140m‚ but MultiChoice appears to have also benefited through transactions involving the Minister of Communications’ cancellation of the roll-out of a competitive encryption service for all TV platforms,” said Outa in a statement.

“MultiChoice has denied allegations of a corrupt relationship with Muthambi, and said that the fee structure for its ANN7 contract was in line with the costs of developing and running such a channel‚ and ANN7 is definitely not the highest-paid local news channel on the DStv platform.”

In a statement released on Sunday, the Democratic Alliance also called on MultiChoice to publicly release the full contracts it entered into with ANN7. Should MultiChoice “fail to do so within 48 hours, the DA will request that the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa [Icasa] force it to do so”, said DA MP Phumzille van Damme.

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