Mwasa walks out of SABC talks

Johannesburg - The Media Workers' Association of South Africa (Mwasa) walked out of SABC turnaround strategy consultations on Thursday morning, announcing that it would no longer participate in the talks.

"The SABC is not taking this process seriously and it's being unprofessionally managed. You cannot turn around an organisation if you don't understand it," said Mwasa general secretary Tuwani Gumani.

"The strategy is wrong. I don't even think there is any strategy," he said.

Gumani said the SABC's problem resulted from years of mismanagement and a lack of human capital and expertise.

"They believe they can change the engine of an aeroplane when it's airborne."

The turnaround strategy was not just about "simply sorting finances", he said.

Root cause

"We need to jointly investigate the root cause of the problem. We need to understand the fundamentals.

"You need to have skills... Right now, the SABC is just mumbo jumbo."

He said the public broadcaster was making "short-term cosmetic changes" rather than long-term ones.

Mwasa was also withdrawing so it did not risk the livelihoods of SABC staff and further soil what "little faith optimistic citizens" had in the public broadcaster, Gumani said.

"This toxic situation does not in any conceivable way inspire confidence," he said.

Door still open

SABC spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago said "the door was still open" should Mwasa change its mind.

"As you would know, we... committed to engage with the unions about the processes last year. This was our third meeting with them," he said.

Kganyago said Mwasa members did not raise their concerns before they walked out of Thursday morning's meeting.

"If they had issues, they should have made them known before they walked out... they didn't give reasons [but] we are waiting for them to reconsider and come back," he said.