[Editorial column] It’s an image issue…

Last Thursday, 28 May 2008, according to the Mail &Guardian Online, SABC spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago said that the corporation viewed the news site’s posting of the uncut version of the so-called Zapiro show on its website as “unprofessional” and that the posting had undermined the public broadcaster. Today, Chris Moerdyk poses the question SABC vs M&G: will the truth ever come out?.

The truth may yet come out, but the regrettable fact is that, irrespective of the outcome of that issue, senior officials and the board itself have not helped the broadcaster’s image in the minds of a great many members of the public. The Zapiro show ‘on… off… on… off…’ farce is doing nothing for the broadcaster’s image, nor, in the face of a severe financial crisis, do reports of board meetings being in luxury hotels, and six ‘buying trips’ to the US by just one official… and that’s since October!

Senior officials should be leading by example, and if they don’t, it’s very likely critics will continuing roasting them.

Not a pipe dream but a reality

On a completely different topic, also last week Thursday was the media/social media visit to the Seacom undersea cable landing site at Mtunzini in KwaZulu-Natal - a long day spent mostly in transit, with only a very short period of time devoted to group questions and answers. Why couldn’t a Q&A session have been held over a PA system on the bus?

Be that as it may, Seacom CEO Brian Herlihy delivered an inspiring and emotive presentation at the conference centre in Ballito… a venue strangely without adequate Internet access which impacted on bloggers and journalists’ ability to report promptly in this day and age of instant news gratification.

Apart from those couple of hiccoughs, it was fascinating to hear about the strategy behind Seacom’s social media presence from the CEO of the agency responsible, Angus Robinson of Brandsh. Through social media tools such as Twitter, an app on its Facebook page, YouTube and soon a blog, the aim is to give face and personality to the Seacom brand, to make it less of an enigma, to a create a groundswell of demand from the bottom up - from the very techies and consumers who are customers of Internet service providers that could be connecting to the cable to improve Africa’s Internet experience.

With everything still on target for 27 June, the main question on everyone’s lips is: “When will we start seeing a direct benefit in terms of increased bandwidth and price reduction?” The answer to that? It’s up to consumer demand.

Go go go, go Seacom, go!
The biz editorial team

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This column originally published 1 June  2009.