SAFTA 2015 Nominees: Unscripted and Informative Programming Highlights

Earlier this week the nominees for the 2015 edition of the South African Film and Television Awards were announced. I thought I would look at a few of the unscipted categories, and other categories that have some newser nominees:

The documentary film, The Vula Connection, which was broadcast multiple times on eNCA (and is produced by eNCA sister company Sabido Productions) landed three nominations: Best Documentary Feature, Best Achievement in Cinematography - Documentary Feature and Best Achievement in Editing - Documentary Feature.


In the Best Magazine Show Category, the SABC's 50/50 and Mooiloop is nominated alongside eNCA's short format show, Movers and Shakers, which is hosted by Vusi Zion.

Mover's and Shakers' Vusi Zion is also nominated in the Best Presenter in a Magazine Show, alongside Darren Green, from the SABC's Doctor's Orders, and the group from Mooiloop, who are nominated as a collective.

In the Best Presenter in a Variety Show (though by looking at the list I have no idea what a "variety show" is), eNCA's Jeremy Maggs is nominated for presenting weekly advertising and marketting show Maggs on Media. Also nominated in this category is Katlego Maboe from SABC 3's breakfast show, Expresso, Katlego Mlambo from eTV's Kasi-Licious and Phat Joe from SABC1's The Real Goboza.

Battle of the Satirical Shows
Both of South Africa's current affairs satirical shows, Late Nite News with Loyiso Gola and ZANews: Puppet Nation, are nominated multiple times in the comedy categories.

Late Nite News, which airs on eNCA and eTV, received four nominations: Best Achievement in Directing TV Comedy (Kagiso Lediga), Best Achievement in Scriptwriting - TV Comedy, Best Achievement in Sound - TV Comedy, and  Best Achievement in Cinematography - TV Comedy.

Puppet Nation (Which I would say is the one bright spot on the whole Starsat platform) received nods in all of the four previous categories, and a whopping 7 more, including one of the major ones, Best TV Comedy.



The 2015 SAFTA's take place on the 20th and the 22nd of March at Gallaghar Estate.
 

Rands And Sense Back on ANN7

ANN7's business-themed news bulletin, Rands and Sense, is back on the channel's schedule.

The show has, of course, taken on many forms since the channel launched: from being a daily show, to being branded business inserts on ANN7 Prime.

But those inserts then came to an end when ANN7's business anchor, Tirrin Cosway, left the channel.

This time, however, it takes the form of a daily half hour markets round up and airs at 5:30pm.

It is hosted by Nastassia Arendse, who joined the channel late last year and is a former anchor/reporter at CNBC Africa.

However, the downside of this, for the time being at least, is that there is still no business reports on ANN7 Prime.

ANN7 LINEUP SHAKEUP: Abigail Visagie To Vuka Africa

In an unexpected move, ANN7 (DStv 405) will be shaking up its early day schedule by moving current Express Lunch (and Mid Morning Prime) anchor, Abigail Visagie, up to the breakfast show, Vuka Africa.

At Vuka Africa, which airs daily between 6 am and 9am, she will sit alongside longtime Vuka Africa anchor, Peter van Onselen. This now means that Vuka Africa becomes the only ANN7 show to feature two anchors as hosts (which will be interesting to see how the squeezed behind that odd table).

Though both of them may be pushing the move as if it is a promotion, what is actually going on is that Abigail now clears the lunchtime slot, meaning that there will now no longer be anchors that anchor only a mere half an hour show due to the channel having too many weekday anchors and not enough time.

Abigail has, of course, been with ANN7 since inception as one of the many young females the channel had try out on air and has moved around slots a few times before settlingon what is now known as Express Lunch.

It is ecpected that Juliet Newell would be announced as the new Express Lunchhost, though that is not set in stone yet.

Pat Pillai Resigns From eNews Prime Time

Pat Pillai, the longtime anchor of eNews Prime Time, has announced in a statement released this morning that he will be leaving the organization.

This comes as eTV prepares for its biggest ever prime time shakeup that would see the English bulletin pushed back to 8:30pm.

Other than anchoring the Tuesday and Thursday editions of eNews Prime Time, Pat also hosted the chat show, Inside Out with Pat Pillai, which aired on the then eNews Channel during the channels early years.

No replacement has been named yet, but Cathy Mohlahlana continues to anchor the Monday and Wednesday editions of the bulletin.

The timing of the departure cpuld not have been worse: viewers will now not only have to adjust to a major time change, but will also have to get used to a new on screen product as well, which could alienate viewers that are used to things being a certain way. With a time change alone, you would try your best to keepbsome sort of consistency going.

Pat Pillai anchors his final bulletin on Thursday, February 26th, about a decade since first joining.

Budget Coverage Recap

SABC News' business anchor, Francis Herd, and Morning Live's Ayanda Allie Paine broadcast from Cape Town (side note: both are former eNews anchors). Francis was also the first journo to get an interview with Minister Nene after his speech. 

eNCA had business anchor Arabile Gumede in studio from early morning in their buildup to the budget speech.Bhavna Singh and Andrew Barnes anchored News Day from Parliament. Due to the budget speech, eTV viewers got to see the full edition of News Day from 1pm until 4pm. Later in the day, eNCA balanced their budget coverage with the latest developments in the leaked documents saga.

On ANN7, Juliet Newell anchored from their studio in Johannesburg. I don't know if her sitting in for Karabo Yibe today was a coincidence or not, but Juliet is of course a former business anchor at Summit TV (now Business Day TV). Avumile Qongqo was in Thembisa getting reaction on the budget from regular citizens.

Of course, as expected, both Business Day TV amd CNBC Africa provided round the clock coverage on the budget.

Openview HD [Finally] Crosses 100 000 Active Decoders Mark

Openview HD, South Africa's second free to air satellite platform, has finally crossed the 100 000 active decoder milestone, as of February 18th 2015.

This comes a year and a bit after the service was launched on the 15th of October in 2013 by Platco Digital, a sister company of free to air broadcaster eTV.

Though the service was launched with much fanfare and hype in 2013, uptake has been very slow due to the high costs associated with the getting platform, around R1500 at launch, something many poorer consumers who might have wanted the service just could not afford.

In contrast a standard DStv installation costs R499 and Starsat R299.

Impact of Slow Sales
This has led to problems not only for the platform and the channels it hosts, but for decoder company Ellies as well, who blamed their unimpressive financial results on the slow growth of the platform (which in turn led to a scandal about a certain executive buying certain shares, which will not be discussed here).

The disappointing growth is evident when you look at the platforms channels as well:
There has been very few new channels since launch, though there are always announcements that a new channel would come 'soon,' showing that prospective content suppliers are not willing to pay to get onto the platform.
The channels added after launch include a religious channel, a community channel, and, after listening to viewers' demands, a self-compiled music channel, though one would imagine viewers are more interested in relatively more expensive channels that have things like sports and news.
One channel, Bicars, also 'merged' with another channel, though viewers complain that they do not see Bicars programming being carried at all.
Perhaps the most curious sign (well at least to me) of the disappointment in the platform's growth is in eTV's eKasi+. The channel started with a few original programmes with the promise of more coming in the future, but since then every show that has been shown on the channel evetually gets repeated on eTV or starts its first run episodes on eTV.

Legal Troubles
The platform also faced other challenges, especially in the legal realm. At first, the very legality of the platform was challenged as it was argued that they did not have a licence to broadcast. This was reminiscent of the same struggles the now defunct  Free2View faced when they launched a similar service, though eventually both platforms somehow worked around this.

The legal troubles did not end there as the next thing that was brought up was that for any channel to broadcast from the platform, they would also need a licence. Yet again, a work around was found.

The platform was yet again challenged in court, now by the SABC, that said that the platform was carrying their channels illegally, and yet again OpenviewHD came out tops.

The Competition
Though Openview HD could be sen as being competition for all broadcasters, pay tv and free to air, the platform was in direct competition with state signal operator  Sentech's Vivid platform. While gearing up for the launch of Openview HD, Sentech decided to rebrand Vivid, which itself had been struggling, to Free Vision and promised new channels would follow in the future, which obviously is yet to launch.

Actual pay tv platforms also pose a threat to the platform as their lowest-tiered sevices, like DStv's Easyview at R29/month, is seen as having greater value, especially with the addition of news channels and sports, something Openview HD subscribers have long been calling for. Added to this is the major difference in entrance costs: R1500 for Openview HD vs the heavily subsidised R500 for DStv.

Looking to the Future
It has taken approximately a year and four months for the platform to reach its first 100 000 subscribers. It will be interesting to see what happens in future not only for natural growth, but also to see how Openview HD will fit in the increasingly competitive video entertainment market which includes not only more pay tv and online services in the future, but also with the launch of Digital tv, when it eventually comes

CONFIRMED: Nzinga Qunta the New Anchor of ANN7 Prime

Nzinga Qunta has confirmed via Twitter that she is now the permanent anchor of ANN7's ANN7 Prime. The tweet can be seen below:

Yes :) "@ThembiMrototo: Are you there permanently now? RT @NzingaQ: So exciting anchoring Prime :)"
— Nzinga Qunta (@NzingaQ) February 16, 2015

She has been anchoring the show for two weeks now, currently her third, which included doing the channel's State of the Nation Address Coverage last Thursday.


Nzinga has been with ANN7 since the start of the channel and has previously been the anchor of the weekend edition of the show.


There is currently no word yet on what now happens to Juliet Newell who joined the channel in December and was even announced as the anchor of ANN7 Prime, replacing Chantal Rutter Dros who departed in December, but then lost that position barely a month later. At the moment, she does anchor a mere 30 minutes of news at 2pm on the channel, but that cannot last too long.


Nzinga, who is studying this year while being a Monday to Friday anchor at ANN7, now becomes the youngest anchor in South African prime time news. She is also the only anchor in prime time that is NOT a journalist, as she pointed out a while ago on Twitter, but based on her on screen presentation, one would not even notice.

CNN Relaunches CNN Newsroom

CNNi (DStv 401) has announced that they will be relaunching their CNN Newsroom block that airs on weekday mornings between 7am and 11am CAT.

This follows months of testing various anchor lineups to see what gels best and they have finally settled on a permanent anchor lineup.

From 7am to 9am African viewers can look.forward to veteran anchor John Vause, who is joined by Zain Asher, who joined CNNi a few months ago from CNN Money.

From 9am to 11am, viewers can look forward to longtime anchor Rosemary Church alongside former African-based correspondent, Errol Barnnett.

They will thankfully be abandoning the dreaded bluebscreen backgrounds and will fully adapt the look of CNN Today, which airs after midnight in the African region.

Other than that, viewers can expect the news they have become used to seeing at those times on CNNi.

SONA2015: My Last post

This will be my last post around the 2015 SONA Address. Here you will find pictures of every channel that carried the President's address live, with the exception of etv, which I did not get to.

All in all, the 2015 SONA Address was broadcast over 7 channels:
2 were free to air: SABC 2, eTV
5 were pay tv: of which one was a continental broadcaster (CNBC Africa) and the other four local news channels (eNCA, The SABC News Channel, ANN7 and The Parliamentary Service)

All five pay tv channels also streamed the event online for free:
eNCA, SABC News and the Parliamentary Service through Youtube
ANN7 and CNBC Africa through their own websites

Business Day TV was the only local news channel to not cover the event.

(Again, apologies for the poor quality as I am still having to use my cellphone to blog as MTN are dragging their feet to repair my computer. One month now)

SONA2015: SABC News and their Vanilla Reporting

By far the most disappointing coverage of the SONA Address, the SABC really did nothing to distance themselves from their reputation as the 'mouthpiece of the ANC.'

They were the last channel to go an air with rolling coverage of the event at 5:30pm with anchors Ayanda-Allie Paine and Vuyo Mvoko, and were the first to stop covering the event not too long after President Zuma stopped talking (probablyvso that Ayanda could get enough sleep to throw softball questions at the president at the next morning's The New Age Breakfast Briefing).

The channel did not have any independent or other form of analyst in studio, with the two anchors providing a very lightweight preview of the adddress and just letting viewers enjoyvthe view of what they are seeing.

This would have been okay during any other year, but for the broadcast to nearly flat out ignore the elephant in the room in the preview was rather pathetic.

What makes things worse is that they completely ignored the arrival at the EFF at parliament or the chaos around the blocking of the signal, which included the protest that took place in Parliament.

If you are one of the millions of viewers that make the SABC the most watch channel during events like this, you.would have had no idea of what was really going on.

I have nothing further to say.

SONA2015: eNCA Shines

By far the channel with the best coverage of the 2015 Sate of the Nation Address, eNCA showed viewers what they are really capable of.

The coverage was anchored.from 4pm by Oman Rappetti and Ben Said, who were at the Parliamentary precinct. They were joined in their makeshift studio by a different political analyst every hour, as opposed to having a whole panel sittimg there for a full hour (even though the analysts were great, eNCA viewers missed the usual duo of Justice Malala and Angelo Fick).

The 6pm analyst, Judith February, stayed with them through the rest of the evening as well and provided great analysis to whatever was happening in parliament and, when needs be, did the anchor's job of providing a 'play-by-play' commentary as well.

eNCA, whose coverage was broadcast on free-to-air broadcaster etv as well, provided comprehensive coverage of what happened outside of parliament as well, be it the moment the EFF was thrown out of parliament and the DA left. However, trying to juggle way too many things did kind of bite them in the butt when they opted to cover remarks from the DA on why they left while President Zuma was speaking already. In a perfect world and in a situation like this, a news channel would realise that they are not the only channel airring the same thing and in this situation they could've covered what was going on outside more because President Zuma's speech was being seen on five other channels as well, none of which had the rrsources eNCA had to cover what was goingvon outside, or as in the case of the SABC, flat out ignoring it.

Way too much Sample Group
The evening before SONA, eNCA announced that they would do a first of its kind in South Africa experiment by having a sample group of thirty urban middle class Gauteng residents, a way too specific and unrepresentitive demographic, provide minute by minute feed back on the address.

The group were hosted in the eNCA studio used by Maggs on Media and the Afrikaans eNuus bulletin (which relocated to the eNews Prime Time studio for the evening, see picture below), the only studio equipped to have an audience (the last time I remember them having an audience there was back when they hosted a debate between political parties during the 2011 Election season).

The segments were hosted by News Night anchor, Jeremy Maggs (for some reason this guy never goes to Cape Town for the SONA or the budget speech) and he was joined by Social Media Editor Gareth Edwards who acted as a sort of roaming reporter in the crowd. It would have been better if they had Siki Mgabadeli doing these segments as she is the host of a similarbstyle show, The Big Debate.

However, it soon became apparent that the channel would focus way too much on this focus group, dedicating way too much time to it and doing way too many inserts on it.
Guess where eNCA was the once President Zuma stopped speaking? No, not outside Parliament where the other news channels were where there were so many great potential guests, but in Johannesburg speaking to a group of people taken off the street.

Yes, doing thatvkind of thing can have value, but eNCA should have followed CNN's footsteps whereby they only cross to the group at the end of the evening when all the events are said and done and there is not any other more news worthy things happening.

No More PowerFM
This was the first time in a while that eNCA did a special broadcast from parliament without the guys from Power FM, which is something that was not missed at all, with thebexception of Ursula Tshikana's red carpet expertise.

SONA2015: ANN7 Focusses On Analysis

ANN7 covered the State of the Nation Addres with three reporters in Cape Town and everyone else in the comfort of the studio in Midrand.

The reporters in Cape Town were Cape Town-based Kevin Brandt, along with Avumile Qunu and Clement Manyathela.
Though they had fewer reporters than the other channels on the ground, viewers would not have noticed.

Their coverage was anchored by Nzinga Qunta, who took over at 6pm. She was joined by analysts Themba Dlamini, Dr Wally Serote and also economist Francois Stoffberg.

They had more live visuals than any other channel, actually showing the anchor and studio guests very rarely, with them.playing a mainly commentary role. 

They also covered the arrival of the EFF and all controversies in the parliament, something only they and eNCA aired.

Their constant use of on screen graphics and split screens finally had value as they showed what was happening in twobplaces at the same time, like the chaos in parliament and the president arriving concurrently.

ANN7 was the last channel to stop rolling coverage of the event at 10pm, with a special Night Cap hosted by Gladys Sithole following immediately after.

SONA2015: The Parliament Cries 'Bring Back the Signal' As the President Arrives

At about 6:45pm on the evening of the State of the Nation Address, news channels had two major developments to cover at the same time: thevarrival of the President, and all the bell and whistles asspciated with that, and a major 'Bring Back the Signal' chant from within parliament.

Both ANN7 and eNCA covered the developments from inside the chamber, with ANN7 doing what they do best, using split screens to show both events happening at the same time while the audio was solely from inside parliament. This was a very powerful visual when one contrasts the calmness amd pomp and circumstance from outside parliament with the chaos from within, which was very reminiscent of what American cable news channels did last year when they decided to run a split screen of President Obama calling for calm in Fergueson on the one side with the chaos of Fergueson on the other.

eNCA had the visuals from within parliament with an occasional cut in of the President's arrival, though also staying soleley with the audio from insode parliament.  All the while, they had their graph of their focus group on the screen, which was largely in the red throughout.

Interestingly, both SABC News and the Parliamentary Service chose to cover just the President's arrival, flat out ignoring what was happening inside the parliament, meaning their viewers had no idea what was going on inside at that very moment.

SONA2015: ANN7's Clement Manyathela Robbed

Clement Manyathela was the first tv journalist to break the news of the chaos at the EFF Press Conference today, but what happened next to him is rather newsworthy on its own.

While reporting on the events unfolding at the press conference, an unknown EFF supporter snatched his back pack, along with City Press's Adisiwe Makinana's iPad cover.

On their way out, they dropped the iPad cover (probably realising there was nothing in it) but ran with the bag.

Thisbis the second incident of bad luck experiwnced by an ANN7 crew this year as earlier in January senior reporter Kalden Ongmu was attacked by a group of rioters.

SONA 2015: 4pm News Review

From 4pm, ANN7 and eNCA were moving fullsteam ahead with covering the SONA debate.

On eNCA Iman Rappetti and Ben Said co anchored coverage from their makeshift parliamentary studio with Paula Chowles on the ground. Their coverage remains mainly in their makeshift studio talking to their analyst, Abdul Waheed. This is the first time eNCA did the full 4pm hour from Cape Town as previously they would do the hour from both Johannesburg with the normal anchor and Cape Town, once again sidelining Duduzile Ramile, who does Afternoon News. (The more I see Ben Said anchoring this evening the more I wish we saw him more often)

On ANN7 Karabo Yibe anchored from the studio with their political editor Ralph Mathekga, analyst Frank Meintjies and
another professor. Avumile Qunu was at the red carpet getting details on what people were wearing with Kevin Brandt in a building nearby looking down on parliament, though the cross overs between the studio and parliament did not go very smoothly (Avumile is a hard news journalist, but interestingly this is not the first time she does red carpet duty). Initially I was skeptical about them doing things based from their Midrand studio but things aren't that bad as they are staying mainly with live visuals with the studio guests acting mainly as voice overs.
As the time passes, the crossings to Cape Town become more and more silly due to the in studio guests interrupted mid sentence by Avumile talkong to someone. This also leads to sound issues. What makes things more annoying is that these interruptions stop people talking about actual news issues to talk to guests about clothing.

At 4pm, The SABC News Channel was still doing their standard schedule with PM News covering the SONA amongbmanyvother stories. Though it may seem odd, it could be quite competitive in attracting viewers not that interested in 24/7 coverage of the address.

SONA Lunchtime BulletinReview

The 1pm hour is a popular hourbof news as people are on their lunchbreaks.

As such, the news channels had a packed 1 hour bulletin in the buildup to tonight's SONA speech by President Zuma.

Just before 1pm, ANN7 was the first news channel to break the news of chaos at an EFF Press Conference. Clement Manyathela reported byvtelephone from the scene.

They were followed by eNCA, who had a report, though no live crossing to someone on the ground.

Andrew Barnes co anchored News Day from parliament, with Bhavna Singh in studio (which is a reverse from what we had seen this whole week whereby Bhavna had been reporting from the Mining Indaba down the road at the Cape Town Convention Centre) .
Andrew introduced a report, and was then  interviewed by Bhavna, highlighting things like security issues, noting that he had never seen this level of security ever before. (It is interesting to see that Bhavna was in studio as she herself is accredited to be in the parliamentary precinct)

Over on ANN7, Abigail Visagie hosted two analysts in studio, highlighting what to expect in the actual speech, focussing on economic issues and touching on energy issues.

This was then to be followed by an interview with the EFF's Andile Mngxitama, which would have been a major get for the channel, but, as ANN7 struggles to shake of their reputation of suffering rom difficulties, did not takeplace.
Luckily they improvised and had Clement Manyathela back on providing an update on the situation. Eventually, Andile was on air, but he did not provide any value.

Just before 1:30 pm (when the news on eTV ends), eNCA was first to  actually air footage of what happened at the presse conference.

If the SABC News Channel is your channel of choice, you might not even.know today was the State of the Nation Address. They had theirbstandard business centric 1pm.bulletin and featured the SONA as if it was just any other story.

eNCA Employing Live Approval Ratings for SONA Debate

In what is described as a "a first for South African tv," eNCA (DStv 403) will be using a live tracking system for this year's SONA debate, taking place tomorrow, February 12th.

The system will be providing live feedback from a 'special' sample group that will react to evwry comment being made by the president, or to whatever disruptions happen in parliament.

The sample group were chosen randomly by an independent firm, though they contain only urban Gauteng residents, meaning they are not representitive of the entire South African population, though they do give a sort of snapshot.

They will be using a remote-like device
on which they will a knob based on what the president says: ofbtheyvlikebwhat they hear, turn up, if they don't turn down.

These fluctuations will then be added up and tracked on a minute by minute basis, providing real time perspective on what urban Gauteng residents are thinking.

If the technology seems to ring a bell to you, thatvis because it is often used by CNN during coverage of major political events like debates. At CNN, they have a live onscreen graphic throughout speeches reflecting the approval ratings, they discuss the sample group's reaction with their analysts and they actually talk to the sample group afterwards to get more in depth analysis.

It is unclear which of the above eNCA will be doing, but either way, the project that the channel is referring to as a "social experiment," seems rather exciting.

The Parliamentary Service Starts Broadcasting In Widescreen

In anticipation of Thursday's State oth the Nation Address, the Parliamentary Service, the video broadcasting platform of the South African Parliament that is shown on DStv channel 408 and Youtube, has started broadcasting in widescreen.

This is part of the 'upgrades' to the Parliament's audio-visual equipment that the media were told about about a week ago.

The actual video quality is also better, as seen in Tuesday's pre-SONA press conference.

The widescreen broadcast now means that the three local news channels, eNCA, ANN7 and The SABC News Channel, all whom broadcast in widescreen, will now no longer have to usethe odd aspect ratios that they have used in the past, which included squashing the picture, using black bars on the side of the screen and cropping the feed.

This now also means that CNBC Africa is the only local news channel not to broadcast in widescreen.

Jon Stewart Announces He Is Leaving The Daily Show

In the episode of the Daily Show that aired last night, February 10th, in the US (and tonight here in South Africa, Jon Stewart announced to his studio audience that he plans on retiring from The Daily Show, one of Comedy Central's biggest brands.

He has hosted the show for the past sixteen years.

His announcement about his departure follows just a few months after Stephen Colbert signed off from the Colbert Report, a show that was spun off from The Daily Show, so that Stephen could get ready to replace David Letterman on the CBS network's The Late Show.

Though The Daily Show satirises news, Jon is often referred to as one of the best media critics of our time and has even been named one of the most trusted news anchorsbin polls conducted in the US.

It is unclear when exactly he will be signing off from The Daily Show, but CNN's Brian Stelter reports that Jon wants to leave as early as July, though Comedy Central wants him to stay until as late as November.

What is also unclear at the moment is what, or who, will replace Stewart as thebonly thing we know for certain is that Comedy Central has said that it would like the franchise to live on.

Here is Comedy Central's statement on the departure:
"For the better part of the last two decades, he have had the incredible honor and privilege of working with Jon Stewart. His comedic brilliance is second to none. Jon has been at the heart of Comedy Central, championing and nurturing the best talent in the industry, in front of and behind the camera. Through his unique voice and vision, The Daily Show has become a vultural touchstone for millions of fans, and an unparalleled platform for political comedy that will endure for years to come. Jon will remain at the helm of The Daily Show until later this year. He is a comedic genius, generous with his time and talent, and will always be a part of the Comedy Central family."

Hajra Omarjee Upped To Political Editor at

Hajra Omarjee has been promoted to Political Editor at Gauteng's PowerFM.

This follows not too long after she started appearing on the station on weekends last December after resigning from ANN7.

Simce December, she has appeared more frequently on the station and has now culminated with her joining as Political Editor.

Another tv news personality promoted, so to say, at the station, is eNCA' News Night anchor Jeremy Maggs that has now started doing a weekday news hour at 12 on PowerFM. Previously he did a weekend show.at the station, which aired at the same time his other show at eNCA, Maggs on Media.

What On Earth? Juliet Newell Now Anchoring Afternoon News?

In late December 2014, Juliet Newell joined ANN7 and anchored the channel's prime time bulletin ANN7 Prime. In mid January this year, she was named the official anchor of ANN7 Prime.

But now, for some reason, she has not anchored ANN7 Prime for well over a week, with Nzinga Qunta taking up that slot.

So where is Juliet? Anchoring the 2pm slot of news (which is an unbranded straight news bulletin), Nzinga's old slot.

Nzinga Qunta, who has been with ANN7 since inception, has anchored various slots over the year and a few months that the channel has been on air, including weekend prime time, before settling in the 2pm slot.

However, she decided to go back to university this year and has been off air for a while before reappearing as the Prime anchor last Monday

At this point, the channel has not stated whether the timeslot swap is permanent or not to accomodate Nzinga's studies, in the same way they accomodated Chanté Jantjies' studies by moving her off a daily slot to weekend breakfast anchor.

Juliet is still featured on the promotional material for ANN7 Prime, even though she has not appeared on the show in over a week.

Though it is not uncommon for news channels to shift anchors around (I last recall it happening at eNCA when Joanne Joseph was moved from Afternoon News to the midmorning slot), it is odd when it happens to the Prime Time anchor. Imagine Jeremy Maggs all of a sudden just starts anchoring eNCA's News Day with some other anchor takong his slot on News Night without eNCA stating why it is occuring.

Either way, viewers can see Nzinga Qunta is enjoying being the youngest prime time anchor on South African news. She smiles wider than she ever did before during the opening of ANN7 Prime, though I don't remember ever seeing her smile before and she does what Juloet doesn't: promote the heck out of the show on Twitter before it airs, informing her over 18 000 followers about who she is about to interview, something Juliet never did.

ANN7 Broadcasts Simba Mhere Funeral live

ANN7 (DStv 405) is currently broadcasting the funeral of Top Billing presenter, Simba Mhere, live and in its entirety.


Weekend breakfast anchor, Chanté Jantjies, anchored the coverage from their studio.


The funeral is being broadcast from the Rhema Bible Church in Randburg and features speeches from family and friends, including the likes of his colleagues at Top Billing.


The channel did not send out a programming advisory telling viewers ahead of time that they will be broadcasting the event.


The SABC News Channel is sticking to its standard schedule, choosing to atream the even on Youtube instead (where even.fewer people will get to see it).


During the broadcast of the funeral, the channel also.put up a brealkng news strap alerting viewers to the passing of South African novelist Andre Brink, the first channel to break that news as eNCA was in taped content and SABC News covering other news.

eNCA Adds Load Shedding Infographic To Screen

With South Africans getting used to the country's energy crisises, eNCA (DStv 403) has added a new onscreen graphic to the channel's news bulletins: a loadshedding level indicator (that is what I think it is called)

And it does just that: Indicate the current load shedding status level, which allows viewers to know at any time when their area will be affected (by checking the corresponding time on a loadsheddig timetable). This is particularly helpful if you miss the short update the anchors give usually closer to the start of the bulletin on what the current load shedding level is.

My only complaint about the graphic, which debuted during News Night with Jeremy Maggs, is that it seems a tad too big and distracting. But I hope it stays.

Like the news ticker and clock, it does disappear during taped shows.

[apologies about this bad article with its bad pictures. I am still blogging from my cellphone ]

[If my posts seem bad as of late due to excessive spelling, punctuation and grammatical mistakes, Im sorry. I have been painfully typing articles on my cellphone for the last three weeks since my laptop decided to give in, but things will be back to normal soon]

#SONA2015: Parliament Releases Media Accreditation List

With the State of the Nation Address occuring on the 12th of February, Parliament has released the list of people in the media that will be covering tje proceedings from the Parliamentary Precinct.

Here are some highlights from the list:

What is ANN7 thinking?
South Africa's youngest, and most troubled, 24 hour news channel is going to be covering the event with a mere 9 people.
This is comprised of one reporter, the Cape Town-based Kevin Brandt, one analyst and... entertainment reporter Avashnee Vandier (yip, the red carpet itself is now that important), along with 6 behind the scenes workers.

What makes this situation sadder is that certain international organisations like the BBC, that will just be covering the event in a segment or two will have more staff there than a South African channel that is clearing its schedule for the event.

For interest sake, I looked at what their list looked like for last year's SONA address (the channel's first as they were not on the air before then) and their lineup looked so much more promising than the crime reporter covering parliament: the excellent Hajra Omarjee as anchor with the likes of Asanda Magaqa, among others, as reporters in the crowd, along with decent analysts.

Left out of their list for this year (who is the rest of the channel's staff but I will only focus on one) is Nzinga Qunta who has been pretty vocal on Twitter about wanting to cover the event. She, of course, anchored the channel's coverage of the ANC's birthday celebrations earlier this year. Earlier this week she tweeted what seemed to be disappointment around not getting to cover the SONA address.

However, it should be noted that just because they will only have three on screen reporters inside parliament's walls for the event that there wont be others. The channel's coverage will probably just be done from their studio in Johannesburg, which would be rather disappointing.

eNCA
eNCA will be broadcasting live from parliament from at least 1pm as both Andrew Barnes and Bhavna Singh, the anchors of the Cape Town-based News Day, are accreditted for the the event, though Andrew is expected to contribute outside of News Day's typical broadcast time.

Conrad Koch (the man that pulls Chester Missing's strings) is also listed as part of eNCA's team, so we can expect a few appearances from Chester on the broadcast. Last year, Chester Missing's name was listed on the Media Accreditation list, but his organisation was listed as Late Nite News and not eNCA due to last year he was there mainly to record material for LNN.

It seems as if all of eNCA's Cape Town based talents will be workong that eveing, with the likes of Leigh-Ann Jansen, Lester Kiewet, Michelle Craig and Annika Larsen all working the event. Even Tanya Nefdt, the lady thatvdoes the feel good story at the end of a news bulletin, will be on hand.

An interesting name on eNCA's list is investigative reporter Nkepile Mabuse, host of Checkpoint. Can't wait to see how she will be used, if she will even be used as she might just be there to tape something for her show.

As always, Iman Rappetti will be anchoring the primetime coverage, which will be simulcast on eTV as well

Siki Mgabadeli is also listed as a member of eNCA's team for the SONA address. This is her first year as part of eNCA's team, but she is not new to eNCA's broadcast of the State of the Nation Address as she has appeared in the past when she was part of PowerFM's team that did crossovers with eNCA for the broadcast in the past.

Could we see Hajra Omarjee back on eNCA?
It is unclear whether the relationship with  PowerFM will continue this year, but if it does, it could mean that eNCA viewers could see former political reporter, Hajra Omarjee back on their screens, though for one night only.

Omarjee left eNCA for ANN7 back in 2013, where she was their senior political reporter until late 2014 when she resigned.

She has now reappeared on PowerFM and is listed on their list of talent that will be there for SONA2015, so look out for her on the eNCA broadcast, it will be interesting to see whether she would be acknowledged as a former eNCA reporter.

SABC News
The SABC's broadcast will be simulcast on both the SABC News Channel (I still love that name, for some weird reason) and SABC2. But as you expect, they will have reporters covering the event in all eleven official languages for other broadcasts and radio as well (along with their website). As such they have the largest group of people accredited to cover the event, more than 100 (*coughs*ANN 7 *coughs again* I mean nine).

Looking at their list, it is hard to see who would be anchoring the broadcast as the likes of Vuyo Mkvoko and Leanne Manas are not included. Not even Peter Ndoro, who will be emceeing the now annual The New Age breakfast briefing with the president the next day is listed.

It will be interesting to see how they going to get this broadcast perfect without the big names listed.

Other Broadcasters
Other tv broadcasters that will be having a presence at the State of the Nation Address is CNBC Africa, who will have a skeleton staff at parliament whilst hosting a panel in their Johannesburg studio. BDTV is expected to do the same, though the list does not distinguish BDTV staff from their counterparts at the Business Day newspaper.
Kyknet's news and current affairs brand, Kyknet Aktueel, will also be represented.
Even religious broadcasters Faith Broadcast Network, iTV Networks and Loveworldsat will have representitives covering the address from parliament.

But whichever channel you decide to watch, or listen to if you prefer listening to the radio for whatever reason, the ultimate message will be the same despite how certain channels may spin it: an address by President Jacob Zuma on the State of South Africa, ph and a bit of fireworks is expected as well.

(the full list of accredited media can of course be viewed at parliament's official website and includes not only the listed organisations above but the newspapers, radio stations and even online platforms, like The Daily Maverick, as well)

SONA2015: Officials and Media Meet Over the Parliementary Broadcast Feed

Parliamentary officals met with the South African National Editors' Forum (SANEF), the Press Gallery Association (PGA) and all majpr broadcasters (SABC, eTV, ANN7 and radio group Primedia) to discuss the broadcast feed of the National Assembly ahead of the February 12th State of the Nation Address and the parliamentary year.

The move comes a few months after concerns were raised over the intermittent 'feed cutting' that occurred whenever things got heated in parliament, which happened more frequently once newcomers, the EFF joined the National Assembly.

The meeting agreed that Sanef will make a written submission motivating parliament to review its policies.

These actual policies, framework and constitutional obligations were outlined at the meeting.

Also announced at the meeting was that the actual broadcast equipment inside the National Assembly has been upgraded, which is a welcomed announcement considering the less than stellar picture quality of the feed, most visably that the feed is broadcast in the old 4:3 'square' aspect ratio and not the more modern 16:9 'letterbox' ratio that the news channels, and most channels not showing old tv shows, are broadcasting in. The SABC reports that "the infrastructure will enable parliament to provide greater variety of audio visual feed." [whatever that means]

(h/t News24)