The EFF has stopped its candidates from doing interviews with Metro FM presenter Faith Mangope.
This was revealed by EFF MP Sixolisa Gcilishe in Parliament on Friday, 02 October.
She was speaking in the Portfolio Committee on Communications and Digital Technologies. The committee was hearing from the SABC on its readiness for the 4 November local government elections.
“As the EFF, we had to actually pull our people to stop them from doing interviews with Faith of Metro FM,” Gcilishe said.
She said the problem was the way the presenter handles mayoral candidates.
“You would think that deep-fakes, misinformation and disinformation come from the public, but even their presenters, in the way that they approach the questioning and how they conduct themselves in these interviews with mayoral candidates, it’s concerning.
“Journalistic discretion is very important. The reason why we had to stop our people from doing interviews with Faith of Metro FM is because of how she conducts herself in those interviews,” she said.
Gcilishe did not name a specific interview or question that the party objected to but she asked what the SABC was doing about it.
“What plan do they have with their presenters to make sure that they’ve got facts and are not relying on allegations?” she asked.
SABC Group CEO Nomsa Chabeli did not take up the matter.
“I’m not going to get into some of the comments that have been made about some of our talent on radio. I think there are mechanisms through which to address those concerns,” Chabeli responded.
Communications Minister Solly Malatsi, speaking more broadly about the SABC’s election programming, cautioned MPs against leaning on management over editorial matters.
“It is very important that we resist the urge to try to force management to make editorial pronouncements on, for instance, the structure of the debates, because that is a very thin line,” Malatsi said.
He also urged parties to take up the invitations they get.
“It becomes important for us, equally in our capacities as leaders of our own political parties, that where invitations have been extended, we also honour them, so that there is no sense that there may be exclusion of other parties,” he said.
Metro FM is one of the SABC’s commercial radio stations.
The committee meeting came as the SABC said it was not yet fully ready for the elections. It is still waiting on an extra R120 million for its coverage.