Workers at the SABC had hoped their jobs would be spared, but the SABC is adamant that job cuts must go ahead. The SABC started issuing letters of redundancy and surplus in November 2020.Following objections by unions, political parties, and civil society, it halted the retrenchment process to allow for further consultation last month.
Right2Know Campaign said that the SABC’s contentious retrenchment process was an attack on democracy. Furthermore, it has warned that the public broadcaster’s restructuring plans would affect some of the country’s marginalized official languages.
The campaign’s Michael Graaf said that among them were executive producers of the Sepedi, Sesotho, Setswana, Siswati and isiXhosa TV news desks.Graaf said that the organisation was now considering legal action to stop the job losses.
“People of marginalised languages who don’t get much information in their own home language, for the news to be cut, we could consider it to be unconstitutional and we will consider taking legal action against it,” said Graaf.
Right2Know Campaign was launched in August 2010 as a coalition of organisations and people responding to the Protection of State Information Bill and has quickly broadened its scope to tackle related issues.
The Right2Know Campaign now mobilises on the following legs:
Advance Protest Rights: To promote the right to protest as critical freedom of expression issue, support protesters to understand and defend their rights, and challenge the state and private security when laws, policies, or practice frustrate protest including the electronic and offline surveillance of activists.
Communication Rights: To ensure more equitable access to the internet by reducing the cost of mobile data and expanding the rollout of fibre, and challenging online surveillance as well as promoting the right to privacy.
Participatory Democracy: To support other CSOs (especially local organisations situated in poor communities) to ensure they receive meaningful engagement, and to campaign for Open Meetings. We currently organise through three democratic provincial working groups based in Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal and the Western Cape – as well as an elected national committee made up of representatives from key civil society organisations, community groups and social movements from across our support bases.
