It is important for this study to trace the historical background of broadcasting in South Africa to identify the challenges that the industry has weathered to date, and the various developments that have taken place. . The history of broadcasting in South Africa can be divided into seven periods, as suggested by Fourie (2001). He noted that the period between 1919 and 1936 witnessed the advent of radio in South Africa after broad exposure to the medium by former soldiers in World War I, while the period between 1936 and 1948 saw the establishment of the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), and World War II, as well as the immediate reconstruction era after this traumatic event. The Post-World War II expansion took place between 1948 and 1960, while between 1960 and 1971, the South African broadcasting industry witnessed a period of transformation through technological modernization, although it was also under pressure from an authoritarian government (Olorunnisola & Lugalambi, 2011).
This was followed by a period of political and financial challenge between 1971 and 1981 as a result of the international cultural boycott against South Africa. As a result of financial pressures, the rationalisation of the broadcasting industry took place between 1981 and 1992 and the democratic restructuring of the broadcasting sector finally started in 1992, through the period of the advent of democracy in 1994. This
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restructuring still continues at many levels today as the industry seeks to better serve the public and to make its operations profitable. While radio as a public service should be aimed at making the broadcasting serve the citizens so as to ensure a well-informed populace, the commercial nature of a number of the stations is by nature underscored by attempts to raise profit margins, which might be at the cost of public participation in some cases (Fourie, 2001; Olorunnisola & Lugalambi, 2011).
2.4.1 The advent of radio in South Africa: 1919 - 1936
2.4.1.1 Emergence of amateur broadcasters
Radio came into South Africa in 1919. Broughton (1961) and Fourie (2001) observed that after the World War I and following the lifting of restrictions on the use of radio, three prominent amateurs ventured into broadcasting. Their aim was to experiment with various forms of radio broadcasting to entertain, educate and inform the people. The three early broadcasters were, firstly, John Samuel Streeter, who broadcast grammophone concerts every week. He initially broadcast from Sea Point and later from Observatory in Cape Town. Secondly, Reginald Hopkins broadcast pianola music and messages from his home in Wynberg, Cape Town. Thirdly, Arthur Sydney Innes, broadcast programmes of gramophone recordings from his radio station known as 20B, located in Observatory, Johannesburg (Fourie, 2001).
These broadcasters sought to use radio for the same purpose of entertaining, educating and informing the people as in other parts of the world, such as the U.S.A and Britain, where early radio initiatives were very prominent. The programmes provided by these amateur operators were well received, although the listeners were still but a few as they had to build their own receivers to be able to receive the signals and hear the programmes clearly enough. Gradually, radio's popularity grew as a means of entertainment and these developments moved radio into the next important stage in its developments as commercial technology provided receiver sets. Other notable developments within this period were the experimental broadcasts that took place, the first regular broadcasts and eventually the emergence of the African Broadcasting
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Company, which are also discussed below (Bosch, 2003; Olorunnisola & Lugalambi, 2011).
2.4.1.2 Early experimental broadcasts in South Africa
As radio broadcasting continued to spread across the world, especially after World War I when many men had been exposed to military radio practice and technology, there were some early experimental broadcasts in South Africa and, for example, beginning in 18 December 1923, a series of sixteen concerts were broadcast from the South African Railways headquarters in Johannesburg. The aim of these concerts was to raise funds for the Empire Exhibition and each of the Railway broadcasts only lasted for a period of two hours. Since only few people owned receivers at that time, arrangements were made for group listening at the Railway Institutes located at Pretoria, Germiston and Witbank, with Western Electric providing the transmitting and receiver equipment.
Although the broadcasts were intended for specific audiences, those who had access to receivers throughout the country were also able to listen to them. South Africa was still a British colony in this era, which influenced the broadcasting model of these early radio initiatives (Olorunnisola, 2000; Fourie, 2001). The Radio Act of 1926 was later passed by Parliament and this Act placed all radio transmission and reception, including the issuance of broadcasting licenses, under the Postmaster General.
As outlined by Fourie (2001) and Fokane (2003), the first regular broadcast in South Africa was motivated by the success of the amateur and experimental broadcasts and by public acceptance of the broadcasts. The government thereafter considered the idea of providing regular and sustained radio broadcasts and therefore called for applications for broadcasting licenses. However, each metropolitan area was only allowed to apply for one license per area in this early period. Associated Scientific and Technical Societies (AS&TS) began the first regular broadcasts in Johannesburg on 1 July 1924.
AS&TS took over the equipment used for the Railway broadcasts and they were known as Station JB. The government further issued licenses to Cape Peninsula Publicity Association (CPPA), which began to broadcast on 15 September 1924 from Cape Town and the Durban City Corporation (DCC), which also started to broadcast on 10
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December 1924 (Horwitz, 2001). These three radio stations came up with various business plans like the sale of advertising on air to raise capital and thus ensure their financial sustainability. However, these efforts were not yielding satisfactory results and the three stations only operated for two years before being forced to close down (Fourie, 2001).
2.4.2 The Establishment of the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) Considering the various radio developments that took place in South Africa prior to 1936 and from 1936 – 1948, and the need to make the broadcasting sector better, the government established the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC). For example, the findings of the report by the Reith Panel were subsequently debated in Parliament and the Broadcasting Act No. 22 of 1936 which was passed on the 1st of August 1936, emerged from the deliberations. On same day, the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) began its operations as an entity after an amount of 150, 000 Pounds as a take-off grant was given to the Station by Sanlam (Fourie, 2001).
It must be noted that the SABC was to broadcast with content and in ways similar to the BBC, except that the SABC was not subject to regular commissions of inquiry as it was intended to broadcast in favour of the British colonial government (Fourie, 2001;
Horwitz, 2001). This was a major development for the broadcasting sector at that time and a foundation upon which the broadcasting sector was built. During World War II, the British influence was of course particularly pertinent.
2.4.3 Further developments: Introduction of news services in South Africa
The period between 1948 and 1960 saw some developments in the broadcasting sector with the introduction of news services in South Africa (Marx, 1992). It must however be noted that while radio grew in Britain and the United States, its rapid growth in South Africa was hindered because of the strained relationship between the emerging radio stations and the South African Press Association (SAPA) over the presentation of news.
This was due to the fact that SAPA was of the opinion that radio stations should only broadcast news already published by SAPA (Fourie, 2001). To concur with the SAPA, Station JB was only able to broadcast news that had already appeared in print. In 1936,
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the SABC signed an agreement with the South African Press Association (SAPA) as source of news to provide four news bulletins a day.
It must also be noted that SAPA was responsible for compiling and issuing the news bulletins and that the SABC had no control over the organisation and content of these bulletins. This however changed in 1950, when the SABC established an internal news department and stopped its dependence on certain organisations as sources of news.
For example, the relaying of news bulletins from BBC in London was also stopped by the SABC. With the establishment of the internal news department, the first SABC-produced news bulletin was aired at 07:00 on 17 July 1950 and the number of news bulletins aired increased to six per day in October 1950 (Olorunnisola, 2000).
2.4.4 Other developments: The Commercialisation of the SABC
The development of the broadcasting industry faced its own challenges over time. For instance, Fourie (2001), notes that just like ABC and its predecessors, the SABC also began to experience financial difficulties in 1946; after the end of the wartime media hysteria during World War II. To relieve the financial burden, several options were considered by the management of the SABC, and it was decided that the best option was to commercialise the station and sell advertising time on air. The Schoch Commission was appointed in 1946 to look into the operations of the SABC and assess how to ensure its financial sustainability, with the resulting report presented in February 1948 (Fourie, 2001; Bosch, 2003). The report recommended the establishment of a commercial broadcasting arm of SABC that would be taxed at ten percent of its gross revenue, which would be used to subsidise the running of the SABC (Fourie, 2001).
It is also thought that the available fund would enable the SABC to produce quality programmes reflecting high culture to meet the needs of its listeners. At this stage, “high culture” referred to Eurocentric content, and target audiences would predominantly have been white South Africans of varying ethnic origins, though predominantly English and Afrikaans. The wartime broadcasts targeting black audience sympathy for the British war position did not hold commercial promise, and the average poverty of these
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audiences precluded radio station managers from considering these audiences as of any economic interest to advertisers. Thus, radio to black audiences only developed very slowly, particularly since the government’s strategy in this era was to marginalize black opinion and entirely hinder black civic participation (Fourie, 2001; Bosch, 2003).
The commercial interest in the SABC was however not sustained for long, since the National Government came to power in 1948 and decided to further its political agenda through this medium. The National government did not focus on ensuring the financial viability of the SABC but decided to invest in technology to expand the transmitter network towards providing for additional Afrikaans and rural programming, which had been lacking since 1936 (Olorunnisola & Lugalambi, 2011). The aim of the government was to ensure effective receipt of signals by the majority of the Afrikaaner listeners living on farms and other rural areas, thereby taking radio into the homes of its main political constituency.
A further development in the radio industry was the establishment of Springbok Radio on 1st May 1950. It was to serve as a bilingual commercial service. Springbok Radio was soon to become popular with listeners because of its variety of programmes. Some of the programmes that endeared Springbok Radio to it’s the audiences included soap operas, comedy shows, quiz shows and dramas (Bosch, 2003). Once again, this audience was presumed to be predominantly white, in keeping with the political programme of the National Party (Fourie, 2001).
2.4.5 Introduction of FM services by the SABC
As noted by Fourie (2001), other ways of developing the broadcasting sector, and most importantly the SABC, were considered by the government and the SABC management. To ensure better reception and more channels for the listeners, plans began in 1960 for the introduction of FM (frequency modulation) services. This provided for improved radio reception over a distance of about 60 kilometres, with the establishment of six additional radio channels. Fourie (2001b) noted that the cost was however enormous as the network required the installation of 500 new transmitters and
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towers for the antennas. On 1st June 1960, Radio Zulu, Radio Xhosa and Radio Sesotho were established.
In the following year, on 25th December 1961, the initial three existing services, the English and Afrikaans Services and Springbok Radio began FM broadcasts from the SABC tower in Johannesburg, followed by Radio Zulu and Radio Sesotho. The first regional radio service, Radio Highveld, started to broadcast on 1st September 1964 and followed by Radio Tsonga and Radio Venda on 1st February 1965. This was followed by Radio Good Hope on 1st July 1965 in Cape Town and Radio Port Natal (which later became East Coast Radio) on 1st May 1967 in Durban. These regional stations operated under a strict programme formula such as broadcast of abbreviated news bulletins (Olorunnisola, 2000; Fourie, 2001b). The idea of establishing these stations should have been to bring radio closer to the people and broadcast in the language that listeners identify with and understand, but this was not the case. The aim was however a calculated strategy of the apartheid-era government to influence white audiences into entertainment-based radio, and the black audiences into an uncritical media space by emphasizing traditional music, culturally slanted entertainment in ethnic languages instead of a critical engagement with oppressive politics. News reports were inferior, there were no debates, and the staff of the stations was dominated by white individuals who were fluent in the vernacular language of the station. There are also cases of programming being pre-recorded and censored before transmission, and with no room for audience feedback (Duncan & Seleoane, 1998).
2.4.6 The advent of independent radio in South Africa
More developments occurred in the broadcasting sector with advent of independent radio in South Africa. It must be noted that independent radio stations began to broadcast soon after the introduction of government's policy aimed at creating the so-called independent national states of, for instance, Bophuthatswana, Ciskei, Venda, Transkei and others in South Africa in 1980. As South African legislation was formally not recognised in these independent states, this created a loophole that gave these so called “independent” states the opportunity to set their up own radio stations
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(Olorunnisola, 2000; Bosch, 2003). This was also due to the fact that the protective laws granting a monopoly to the SABC were not binding in these newly created independent states.
These developments therefore led to the advent of stations such as Capital Radio, Radio 702, Radio Bop and Radio Thohoyandou. Their transmitters were located in the respective homelands of Bophuthatswana, Ciskei, Venda and Transkei of South Africa.
It must be noted that these stations made a great impact on radio listeners in their broadcasting radius as they were offering more interesting and quality programmes to meet their needs than the SABC did at that time (Masilela, 1996; Fourie, 2001). This development further shows the power of choice and the importance of identity for listener choices in a period which systematically prevented black audience choices.
While these stations were commercial and serviced broad metropolitan audiences through powerful broadcasting equipment that covered adjacent areas, they pioneered independent decentralized radio and offered content that interested audiences across racial groups, thus initiating cross-cultural participation (Olorunnisola, 2000; Bosch, 2003).
2.5 BROADCASTING AND TELECOMMUNICATION REGULATIONS IN SOUTH