"DVB-T2 technology is the most advanced digital terrestrial technology available. The launch of GOtv in Windhoek puts Namibia at the forefront of deploying the latest digital terrestrial technology and is another exciting milestone in our digital roadmap," said Kalumbi Shangula, chairman of the board of MultiChoice Namibia.
South Africa was the first country on the African continent to ready plans for the switch from analogue to digital TV broadcasting - a process known as digital migration and which has steadily been implemented worldwide and must be completed by 2015.
South Africa has since become an embarrassement due to major governmental, regulatory and industry failures within the process which is marked by extensive squabbling, infighting and an inability to move forward decisively. Very little public participation in South Africa's DTT process means huge shocks are in store for ordinary South African consumers who are not aware of what the process entails and the looming cost coming for TV viewers.
While multiple deadlines have come and gone for South Africa's official commercial switch-over to DTT which will cost the average South African television viewer a minimum of R700 to continue to get access to public television - an exorbitant cost for a developing nation - other African nations are now passing the country.
South Africa has still not managed to issue its final DTT regulations - the latest of an ongoing and constantly revised DTT set of regulations which has left South Africa's major broadcasters, the SABC, e.tv, M-Net and others, not only completely exasperated but constantly being set up to battle each other as they desperately clamour and claw at the scarce spectrum frequency up for grabs.
South Africa's latest switch-on date - which is constantly being further extended over the past years by the department of communications which is supposed to drive the DTT process - was September. A few months ago it was again moved to October.
Its basically a certainty that the October date won't be met either unless the government and industry holds a fake ceremonial event to symbolise the switch-on, since DTT decoders or set-top boxes (STBs) which households will have to buy, won't be commercially available since it won't exist. Neither will any distribution programme. It takes at least 3 months to manufacture a STB to specifications for DTT, and no tenders have yet been awarded.
Final STB specifications - finally finalised after a lengthy and drawn-out process - is still not accessible to the public.
The public is still not aware of what the final decision is regarding the so-called contentious "access control", or the government's insistence that it wants to be able to control the TV signals through the STBs and have the potential to cut it off.
Meanwhile the South African government has not said a single word about how practically a subsidy scheme would work to subsidise poorest households in the country in order to afford a R700 decoder plus an antenna, or how those households will be chosen. No extensive national awareness and educational programme exists to pre-educate South Africans about DTT as was rolled out in other countries. The Digital Dzonga advisory council was disbanded twice and is no longer in existence.
On Monday the minister of communications, Dina Pule, who was supposed to give an update regarding DTT in South Africa to the industry, terminated the press briefing without reasons.
The public pressure group, Support Public Broadcasting Coalition (SOS) which represents a vast group within South Africa's TV industry ranging from academics and trade unions, producers and media institutes to TV and film production sector organisations, issued a strong statement today saying that the SOS Coalition is calling on South Africa's minister to commit "to a firm date" for digital switch-on and the dual illumination period "as well as for how long that will continue and what implications it will have for access to broadly representative, local and credible programming".
The SOS Coalition says it wants from the South African government and the department of communications "a firm date on when the set-top boxes will be available to all sectors of the South African public, for how much, as well as a comprehensive plan for how they will be rolled out, particularly among low-income households."
