The SABC has taken Eben Jansen off the SABC's airwaves indefinitely, pending an investigation into the news anchor's aggressive interviewing behaviour on live television.
It follows a shocking verbal altercation on live television on Thursday on the SABC's 24-hour TV news channel when Eben Jansen interviewed EFF national spokesperson Mbuyiseni Ndlozi during his programme The Newsroom.
Eben Jansen lost his cool within minutes and and started sparring with Mbuyiseni Ndlozi, shortly after introducing him and remarking at the beginning of the interview that Mbuyiseni Ndlozi finally made the interview after getting the times wrong.
The contentious interview quickly devolved and turned into a disgraceful shouting match similar to the FOX News Channel (StarSat 261) with Mbuyuseni Mdlozi who was invited for the interview, asking Eben Jansen repeatedly whether he was going to be given a chance to speak.
"Are you going to allow me to speak? Are you going to allow me to speak?" asked Mbuyiseni Ndlozi.
"I'm not going to allow you to speak anymore Mister Ndlozi because we can't have a conversation," said Eben Jansen, cutting the invited guest off in what started out as an interview about the current hot button topic of the removal and vandalism of colonial and apartheid era national statues in South Africa.
SABC spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago didn't immediately respond to a media enquiry seeking comment on Friday evening regarding Eben Jansen's indefinite on-air removal pending the investigation.
The Mail & Guardian on Friday asked whether SABC News' Eben Jansen is becoming FOX News' Bill O'Reilly.
Meanwhile viewers described the interview as "petty, childish and unprofessional" and wondered why Eben Jansen was using words like "Red Indians", saying his attitude in the interview was "embarrassing and unprofessional".
Eben Jansen was fired by e.tv and taken off the air in 2002 where he was sports editor and sports anchor over on-air comments. Eben Jansen rejoined the SABC three years later in March 2005 as an Afrikaans news reader on SABC2 where viewers complained about his Afrikaans TV news reading abilities.
