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| The History Of South African Broadcasting By Frans Erasmus SA Broadcasting traces it’s history back to 29 December 1923, when the South African Railways made the first wireless broadcast in Johannesburg. On 1 July 1924 the Associated Scientific & Technical Club of Johannesburg took over these transmissions, giving birth to the first SA radio station, “JB Calling”. On 10 December 1924 the Durban Corporation started it’s radio service called “Durban & Pietermaritzburg Calling” and on 15 December 1924, the Cape Peninsula Publicity Association started a similar service in Cape Town called “Cape Town Calling”. Insufficient funding, obtained mostly from public license fees caused all three services to nearly end in 1927, with the permission of the SA Government, The Schlessinger Organisation took over control of all 3 stations & on 1 April 1927 the African Broadcasting Company (ABC) was formed. These services broadcasted in mainly English allowing for an hour of Afrikaans programming daily and 1 daily news bulletin in Afrikaans. The news bulletins, both English & Afrikaans were compiled from newspaper headlines and articles and were read directly from the relevant newspaper. Financial problems still continued & in 1934 the then Prime Minister of SA, General JBM Hertzog ordered an official investigation into all aspects of Broadcasting in SA. This investigation lead to the formation of the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC), under an act of the SA Parliament (Act 22 of 1936). The broadcasts of the ABC ceased and the broadcasts from the newly formed SABC began. At first the new National Service broadcast in English only, the Act however stipulated the inauguration of a parallel Afrikaans Service. In 1937 comprehensive transmissions in both official languages became a reality & the A & B Programmes as these services were called came into being. The first African language transmissions were made in 1940 by telephone lines when as a wartime measure, broadcasts in Zulu, Xhosa & Sesotho were relayed to townships in SA. The service however was short lived & in 1942 short daily African broadcasts could be heard on the medium wave frequencies of the A&B Programme, when these services were not running. On 1 May 1950, the very first commercial radio service in SA, broadcasting in both English & Afrikaans started it’s broadcasts. The new service would be known as the C-Programme, however that name was dropped prior to the first broadcast & the name Springbok Radio was adopted. The new commercial service could originally only be heard in Johannesburg, but quickly expanded to the other major cities of SA & at the end of 1951 was broadcasting to most of the major centers in Short Wave & later on Medium Wave. In 1952, a Rediffusion Service relaying the African language broadcasts was introduced, broadcasting in Southern Sotho, Zulu & Xhosa to townships west of Johannesburg. This gave rise to the formation of Radio Bantu on 1 June 1960. The other African languages followed, Radio Lebowa & Radio Setswana on 1 June 1962 & Radio Tsonga & Radio Venda on 1 February 1965. Meanwhile on 25 December 1961 the first FM transmissions were done, when the Afrikaans, English & Springbok Radio Services could be heard crystal clear for the first time. On 1 September 1964, the first regional radio service, Radio Highveld broadcasting from Johannesburg to the greater Transvaal, Orange Free State & Northern Cape areas started broadcasting on FM. The second regional service, Radio Good Hope, broadcasting from Cape Town to the Western & Eastern Cape Province started it’s service on 1 July 1965. That was followed by the third regional service, Radio Port Natal, broadcasting from Durban to the Natal province on 1 May 1967. On 1 May 1966, the External Service of the SABC, Radio RSA, the voice of South Africa started broadcasting on Short Wave to the world. This service was broadcast from the HF Verwoerd Transmission Station in Bloemendal, broadcasting News & programmes in Afrikaans, English, Dutch, German, Portuguese, French & Swahili. On 12 October 1975 the radio service, LM Radio broadcasting from Mozambique closed down & the SABC relaunches it on 13 October 1975 as Radio 5, broadcasting from Johannesburg on Medium Wave & Short Wave. The 1970’s also saw the introduction of Television in SA. The SABC launched the country’s first TV service officially on 5 January 1976. The 1980’s saw dramatic changes in SA broadcasting. In 1980, Channel 702 (Radio 702) started broadcasting from Bophutshatswana, their broadcasts aimed specifically to the audiences in the greater Johannesburg & Pretoria areas. Capital Radio 604, broadcasting from Transkei & Swazi Music Radio (SMR) also started, challenging the established SABC radio audiences. The SABC expanded it’s radio services by introducing, Radio Swazi on 1 April 1982, Radio Ndebele on 1 April 1983 and the first Indian Service, Radio Lotus on 8 January 1983. The SABC also expanded it’s television service, TV2 broadcasting in Zulu & Xhosa & TV3, broadcasting in the Sesotho languages started on 1 January 1982. A fourth service, TV4, was started on 30 March 1985 to combat the popularity of BOP TV, which started in 1984, broadcasting from Bophuthatswana. In 1987 the first pay tv service in SA, M-Net, started broadcasting from it’s studios in Randburg. On 31 December 1985, the 3 pioneer radio services, the Afrikaanse Diens, the English Service & Springbok Radio closed down, these services were replaced by 2 new national commercial stations, Radio South Africa and Radio Suid-Afrika. The SABC called it restructuring of radio in SA, however they admitted a few months there after that the closure of Springbok Radio was a mistake. A Mistake, sadly that could not be rectified. Three new regional stations also saw the light on 1 January 1986, Radio Jacaranda started it’s broadcasts from Pretoria, Radio Algoa from Port Elizabeth and Radio Oranje from Bloemfontein. Radio 2000, broadcasting live sport commentaries and educational programmes started broadcasting on the old Springbok Radio frequencies and television simulcast broadcasts started on the station on 1 July 1986. The first television programme to be simulcast was “Miami Vice”, which was dubbed into Afrikaans with the original English soundtrack available on Radio 2000. More major changes were to come in the 1990’s when Radio South Africa & Radio Suid-Afrika were changed to SAFM & Afrikaans Stereo respectively on 1 March 1995. Independent broadcasting also became a reality when community licences were awarded to several totally independent stations. Radio Pretoria was one of the first stations that was awarded a license to broadcast, many other stations followed & soon the ether was full of independent radio stations. After a ruling by the Independent Broadcasting Authority in 1995, the SABC was forced to sell 6 of it’s successful regional radio stations. On 30 September 1996, Radio Highveld, Radio Algoa, Radio Jacaranda, Radio Port Natal, Radio Oranje & KFM left the SABC family after being bought up by private companies & interested parties. On the television front, major changes also happened. During October 1991, the SABC introduced a new supplementary Sport television service called TSS (Topsport Surplus). It was relayed on the spare capacity of the TV1 signal & carried the sport broadcasts that could not normally be accommodated on the TV1, TV2 & TV3 Services. On 1 October 1992, the SABC consolidated it’s television services & TV2, TV3 & TV4 became one television service. The service was called, CCV TV (Contemporary Community Values). On 11 February 1994, the TSS channel was replaced by NNTV (National Network Television), broadcasting sport, documentary & educational programmes. These services however were shortlived, on 4 February 1996 the SABC relaunched all 3 television services as SABC 1, SABC 2 & SABC 3, meanwhile the independent television service, M-Net, launched it’s bouquet of Digital Satellite Television, called DSTV. The SABC followed & on 15 July 1996, the SABC Satellite service, Astrasat was born. What holds the future of broadcasting in South Africa? It will be interesting to see in 20 years from now. Frans Erasmus (Johannesburg, South Africa) 21 February 2004 |
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| You are viewing "The History Of South African Broadcasting" (By Frans Erasmus) |
| The following essay was written and provided by Frans Erasmus exclusively for The Pumamouse Website. This well researched essay should give any reader a general knowledge and better understanding of the history of radio and television broadcasting in South Africa. Dankie, Frans. The Pumamouse (MaryAnne) March 2004 |
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