Hlaudi Motsoeneng wants current SABC board to be probed

Axed SABC chief operating officer Hlaudi Motsoeneng says the current board at the public broadcaster should be held to account because it has “turned the SABC backwards”.

“As a new board‚ I don’t think [it] is capable to turn the SABC around because actually they have turned the SABC backwards.

“In this case‚ I don’t see any vision; I don’t see any strategy to bail out the SABC. What I see is people who are like children... waiting for father Christmas to come. There is no strategy since the new board arrived.

Motsoeneng was speaking at a media briefing in Johannesburg on Thursday.

He said the new SABC board had not done anything to take the broadcaster forward.

“They talk about government guarantee. I’m the person who came up with a strategy.

“We got rid of government guarantee because we should not encourage people to get bail from government. All the officials‚ including the board‚ should have a strategy to bail themselves out.”

“They went on a public platform and today they are heroes‚ but for me‚ they are not. They have not delivered anything.”

Motsoeneng said he was not given an opportunity to explain himself and the decisions he took at the public broadcaster but instead he was labelled “stupid”.

“I was not given an opportunity to deal with all these issues; the hullabaloo behind Hlaudi Motsoeneng.

“Everybody was saying Hlaudi is the cause of all these problems‚ from day one until the end.

“I was not given an opportunity to deal with such issues…

Motsoeneng welcomed the proclamation made by President Jacob Zuma for the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) to investigate wrong doing at the SABC.

“I’m very happy that at last‚ there is proclamation because [ it] will give us a chance to deal with real issues at the SABC; what happened in the past‚ while we were still within the SABC.

“This board should be investigated by the SIU. I am aware that they have caused irregularities by not following the governance of the SABC.

According to Motsoeneng‚ there is evidence that the new board has entered into contracts on behalf of the broadcaster‚ a job he says should be done by management.

"The rule of the board is strategy and policy. It ends there‚" he said.