Thursday, 26 February 2009

Retrenchments, or not?

BEMAWU yesterday met with the CFO, Robin Nicholson, the CPO. Phumelele Ntombela-Nzimande and the Group Executive, Pat Naves.

The meeting was inter alia about the financial position the SABC finds itself in and the possibility of retrenchments.

The SABC is currently in a R700M deficit. Immediate plans to rectify the situation were discussed and the SABC will cease recruitment unless it is absolutely necessary to fill a position. The SABC will also make a recommendation to Parliament to increase TV License fees.

The CFO has confirmed that the SABC is in a financial crisis. He said we have to start to be responsible and we have to take difficult decisions to keep the SABC alive.

Our advertising income (85% of our income) is drastically down.

The freelance budgets has already been cut in an attempt to save cost and renovations were stopped.

He also said management and the Board must be managed.

In respect of the substantive negotiations the SABC will revert back to us as to when we will continue negotiations in this respect..

WHAT CAN WE DO

We need input from you as to where the SABC can save money.
If you know of any wastage please let me know. We know of a lot of fruitless and wasteful expenditure. Although the SABC has said that they do not foresee any retrenchments in the short term, we have absolutely no guarantee this will not happen. In fact, we cannot see the SABC surviving with it’s current headcount and the deficit. If the government tells them to cut heads, they will have to.

Therefore it is very important to come up with solutions in time to soften the blow of any possible retrenchments.