An ongoing dispute between pay-television broadcaster TopTV and the Independent Communications Authority of SA (ICASA) is likely to see some resolve today following a high court hearing between the two entities on Friday.
The pay-TV's holding company On Digital Media (ODM) and ICASA have been at loggerheads over the issue of broadcasting pornographic material on SA's TV airwaves since September last year, when ODM submitted an application for three adult channels.
An urgent interdict submitted by ICASA in a bid to halt the imminent launch of three 24-hour channels carried by Playboy UK/Benelux on TopTV, was heard in the South Gauteng High Court on Friday and lasted well into the evening, says a TopTV spokesperson.
“The hearing went on until about 7pm and, at the end of it, it was said that the matter would only see judgement on Wednesday.” The source has, however, since confirmed that some form of resolution is expected today.
Red tape and controversy
Initially tabled for unveiling on 20 December last year, TopTV subsequently changed its pornography package launch date to 20 January amid a storm of controversy.
The standalone package, which will require a separate subscription and PIN and will cost R199 per month, consists of “soft” pornographic material on Playboy Europe and more “hard-core” content on Adult XXX and Private Spice. Content will be screened in repeated cycles.
The move was seen by some as a defilement of SA's airwaves and prompted an outcry from various bodies, including the Film and Publications Board and civil society partners such as the Family Policy Institute and Childline.
In spite of a torrent of moral indignation and calls to boycott the operator altogether, senior manager of regulatory affairs at TopTV Thato Mahapa said the pay-TV operator would go ahead with the launch. Mahapa cited a “glaring departure from the regulated process” by ICASA, which failed to grant or reject its application within the 60-day period allocated by the subscription broadcasting regulations.
ICASA subsequently said TopTV was precluded from offering the pornography package on the grounds that a public consultation, which ICASA is compelled to facilitate, would be under way until the end of January. Only then, said ICASA spokesperson Paseka Maleka, will a decision be made.
A public hearing at ICASA's offices in Sandton kicked off this morning at 10am. According to the TopTV spokesperson, Mahapa is observing the procedure and the public will be notified as to further developments in due course.
Maleka says the public hearing is an oral presentation of submissions made with regard to TopTV's application and, while he could not say when a decision would be made by the authority, it would “have to be made soon” in order to have the issue laid to rest by the end of the month.
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