JOHANNESBURG – Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo on Tuesday instructed the state capture inquiry’s legal team to investigate whether other TV stations had measures in place to verify whether they were being cheated by clients who buy archive footage from them.
Zondo expressed concerns as the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) had no way to monitor whether ANN7 failed to declare that it used more than the 2,000 minutes it bought from the SABC.
Former SABC employee Josais Scott testified at the Zondo Commission on Tuesday that their system was flawed and could have cost the public broadcaster thousands in revenue.
Zondo called on legal team to investigate whether the SABC was robbed of revenue after ANN7 former editor Rajesh Sundraram testified that the SABC had sold the channel hours’ worth of footage for peanuts.
“There should be an investigation whether the complaint that this footage was sold for a song, whether that’s the justification in that complaint or not.”
Zondo said it should also be established whether the agreement between the SABC and ANN7 was a norm at the time.
“I’m sure there should be lots of other transactions of that kind within the country but if there are not, I’m sure the investigation will look at what happens in other countries with TV stations.”
The commission is set to resume on Wednesday morning.
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