There's never been more trash TV on SABC1 than now, with the out-of-touch TV channel of the public broadcaster - the TV channel that still has the biggest viewership due to signal distribution - wallowing in a stew of low-class, non-descript foreign programming, transient celeb-obsessed local trash and a hapless, dated dollop of perfunctory must-show soaps and worn-out local fare that's a public embarrassement.
SABC1's line-up is a far cry of what a channel such as SABC1 is supposed to be: a vibrant and dynamic edu-tain-fountain of functional programming that resonates with current issues and causes, triumphs its viewers, informs and entertains with quality programming. It's no wonder SABC1's ''publicity'' for its programmes has over the past decade slowed to a trickle that consists of schedule updates and insufficient show information on the day a show starts and hardly anything else. Who would take pride in shoveling sad second-rate shows to the press like this? It's clear that SABC1 actually stopped trying a long time ago.
The SABC's poor group sales division that's supposed to try and find advertising for this dreadful programming is reduced to trying to hype up the biggest batch of bull conceivable. I can be first to tell you about the ''awesome'' stuff coming to SABC1 in March. Besides new episodes of the local drama series Sokhulu & Partners (which is good but has been languishing for over a year to get a broadcasting date and was even mentioned in parliament at the end of last year when the SABC discussed all its problems) viewers can ''excitedly'' get ready for the international sitcom... The Game. And movies? How about Menace to Society, New Jack City, Bait, and Above the Rim. And this garbage is what SABC1 is at least willing to highlight to advertisers.
It's shocking and sad how far SABC1 has fallen in its programming, in upholding its own programming mandate as a public broadcaster, its stale and stagnant schedule and the arrogant and unperturbed way it seems to simply throws junk on the schedule where ordinary viewers - a lot who have limited choices - desperately look for something worthwhile between the garbage.
