THE public broadcaster said plans are afoot to increase TV licence fees. Speaking about the increase, the SABC’s Board chairperson, Bongumusa Makhithini said: “While we are still dealing with the financial consequences of well-documented governance failures, the SABC believes these issues are being dealt with so we can put that chapter firmly behind us. The SABC is fully aware that to deliver on this public service mandate requires long term financial sustainability.”
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He added that TV licence fees still remain the second largest source of revenue for the SABC saying they needed to rebase the fee and strengthen the collection of this revenue.
“The SABC’s Television licence fee of R265 has remained unchanged since 2013. Currently the SABC TV licence fee costs an average of 72c a day for citizens who pay. In September 2018 I think we can all agree that there is very little (if anything) you can buy for 72c a day.”
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There are currently only approximately 1,8 million paying television households and businesses out of a total of 9 million accounts on the SABC database.
“To put this in a proper context, we have 14 million TV households and thousands of businesses. While 1,8 million paying accounts is a relatively small percentage, we believe that a credible, trusted and properly run public broadcaster, can create a culture of increased TV licence payment,” he said.
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