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The SACP welcomes the public announcement by the new Minister of Communications, Mr Roy Padayachee about his intentions to move swiftly to bring the much-needed stability at the SABC. We also appreciate the speed at which parliament has moved to fill the existing vacancies that currently exist on the SABC Board. We believe that this will go a long way towards saving the image and functionality of this important institution for the workers and the poor of our country. We call on South Africans with expertise to come forward, be nominated and accept nomination and offer their services to transform the SABC.

A call to boycott the nomination process amounts to nothing but what the SACP has consistently warned about, networks of the liberal offensive, joined by an ultra-left in disarray, to try manipulate our democratic institutions, including an attempt to capture the SABC, for narrow, and often white petty bourgeois and elite interests. Surely it cannot be a principle that if some groupings do not get their way at the public broadcaster then it must be allowed to continue being dysfunctional.

The call for a boycott in this instance is highly irresponsible and reckless and must not be supported. Instead the SACP calls upon all progressive and working class organisations to nominate people for the filling of the vacant board positions at the SABC.

The SACP hopes the Minister and the Portfolio Committee on Communications will leave no stone unturned to get to the bottom of the seemingly perpetual instability at the SABC. We require the necessary vigilance from the workers and the poor to safeguard the SABC as an important institution for them.