ANN7 Tweaks ANN7 Prime, Drops Candy Harris as Co Anchor

Just weeks after the relaunch of ANN7 Prime, the channel has removed Candy Harris as the show's co anchor, opting to go solely with Sebenzile Nkambule instead.

When it launched with two hosts, both female, I remarked that the show seemed very messy having two moderators of the show's many debtates and two anchors speaking to the phone-in guests, which obviously led to incindents when the two spoke over each other.

Now Candy Harris has been, ironically, shifted to Sebenzile's old slot of mid morning news where she anchors solo and occasionally with a trainee anchor.

All News Channels Carry President Zuma's Address about the Marikana Report

eNCA, SABC News Channel and ANN7 all provided extensive coverage about President Zuma's Address to the nation about the Marikana Report.

The speech ran for 32 minutes, from 7:02pm to 7:34pm.

eNCA's coverage was anchored by Jeremy Maggs, with a 2 man in studio panel. Their analysis included in studio debate as well as live crossings to Iman Rappetti who was with families of victims of the Massacre, and Thulasizwe Simelani who was at Parliament getting reaction from the likes of DA reps. Their analysis extended for well after the actual address and the channel ended up preempting this evenings edition of Money Line.
The semi final episode of Tech Report at 9:30pm also got preempted.

SABC News Channel's coverage was simulcast on SABC 2, preempting the Afrikaans News and part of the Sotho news. Their coverage was anchored by Vuyo Mvoko. Though I love the way they use Mvoko as the anchor of their bigger news events so that when viewers see him onscreen they know its big news, constantly benching their regular prime time anchors (Vabakshnee Chety and Peter Ndoro, who anchored this morning's The New Age Buiness Brief) is starting to show a lack of faith in the duo. SABC News Channel was the first of the broadcaster to go back to scheduled programming with Sports Live at 8:30pm

ANN7 Prime with Cand Harris, Sebenzile Nkambule, Ricky Naidoo

ANN7's buildup started well before 7pm, meaning that this evening's edition of Game On! was preempted and will instead be broadcast in its traditional repeat slot of 10:30pm. The coverage was anchored by the new ANN7 Prime anchors Sebenzile Nkambule and Candy Harris. Their three man in studio panel included political editor (and host of Straight Talk) Ricky Naidoo. They also had live crossings to Kevin Brandt who was outside parliament.


If you look at stills at the top of this article, you will see both eNCA and ANN7 both actually had to get the video feed from the SABC News Channel as the state broadcaster was the only one that was allowed to have a camera present at the address.
This led to the onscreen graphics on both eNCA and ANN7 becoming messy with their graphics superimposed upon the SABC's.
When the SABC put up their full lower thirds banner, eNCA decided to black out that part of the screen, leading to nearly a third of the screen being black (though it is technically more on tv's like mine with a letterboxed aspect ratio.

Then, in what I think is a dirty tactic on the part of the SABC News Channel to get free advertising, they decided to remove the small SABC News logo at the bottom of the screen, which was covered by eNCA's and ANN7's graphics and instead put up the massive graphic where the two independent stations couldn't hide it without making the screen too cluttered. They even put a solid backing on the usually transparent logo to make it more eye catching, something they had never done before.

It is really worrying when only one broadcaster, the public broadcaster, is allowed to have a camera at an address by the president of the camera as it could lead to censorship: if that one SABC News Channel camera gets cut for whatever reason, no one outside of the venue would have access to it.

ANN7 Anchor Shake Up (Yet Again)

With Nzinga Qunta out as ANN7 Prime anchor, ANN7 has taken the opportunity to shake up their anchor line up.

Sebenzile Nkambule and Candy Harris. ANN7 Prime, June 22nd 2015

Firstly, and most importantly, mid morning anchor, Sebenzile Nkambule, who joined the channel late last year from Radio 702 makes the giant leap to ANN7 Prime.

Following the success of the double anchor format of Vuka Africa with Peter van Onselen and Abigail Visagie, ANN7 Prime now too becomes double anchored. Sebenzile is joined behind the desk by ANN7 original, Candy Harris, who most recently anchored weekends.

I think their first broadcast together today, June 22nd, was a bit messy and can be cleaned up going forward. Then again that is what I have come to expect with ANN7 recently: things getting better with time. [I don't want to come across as old fashioned or anything, but two female anchors anchoring a news bulletin is not what I am used to, but will allow it to grow on me]

Chante Jantjies (ANN7's youngest permanent anchor), an ANN7 original who anchored the mid-morning slot before Sibenzile then moved to weekend breakfast because of her studies, takes over from Juliet Newell on Express Lunch, a bulletin Chante has occasionally anchored on Fridays. Express Lunch also changes from airing from 12pm to 2pm to airing from 12pm to 3pm, adding an hour. On leaving weekend Vuka Africa behind, she tweeted: "After a year .. my @ann7tv  @VukaAfrica Weekend journey has ended. Thank you to all the early birds who tuned in :)"

The channel's late night block, 10pm to 12am, is now anchored by a rotation of trainee anchors, most of whom are from the ANN7 Anchor Search