Hon House Chairperson and all members here present, permit me to start at the end - the last two paragraphs - and indicate that COPE calls on Parliament to instruct government to urgently address problems faced by the schedule two public entity of the Public Finance Management Act, PFMA, namely the South African Broadcasting Corporation,SABC. We must emphasise that it is in crisis.
South Africans, particularly the working class and the poor, cannot survive without the SABC. We call on government to give
SABC a bailout of not less that R3,2 billion that they have requested. For SABC to survive it needs quality and content. For this to be attained there must be staff. Some amongst us have and continue to campaign for the staff reduction. That campaign is wrong as it both ignores labour relations - that is section 189 as well as skills development including the quality and content that is required.
Furthermore, it has problems of buildings. Those of us who have gone to SABC, not only where their head office is in Johannesburg but all over the country, we have seen the buildings that are collapsing and that has to be addressed. I must emphasise that some of us have been to see one worker who has been in the ICU over the past two months as a result of a building that collapsed and that is a major problem.
There are other very serious problems there as well: They cannot even pay for the electricity and the toilets are blocked and all that. We need to do something. I must say to the Minister, through you House Chairperson, that there needs to be correction because when she gave the committee the report she painted a
picture that she and the Minister of Finance were agreeing in so far as their route to dealing with the SABC problems was concerned.
That which has gone out through the public media ... and I believe and hope that ... [Time expired.]