The department of communications has decided to appeal the court decision to grant South Africa's free-to-air commercial broadcaster e.tv, the public broadcaster SABC and other free-to-air broadcasters control of the conditional access (CA) system in the set-top boxes (STB's) to be used for digital terrestrial television (DTT) and the department of communications will lodge an appeal today.
In December e.tv won a bitter court battle over the encryption system for South Africa's digital television dispensation over South Africa's department of communication. The South Gauteng High Court ruled that South African broadcasters themselves - and not the government - are the ones who have the right to retain and maintain control over the STB control mechanism for digital terrestrial television (DTT) in South Africa.
The court case meant a further delay in the process of South Africa's migration to digital television - now many years behind schedule and falling further and further behind. The brand-new appeal which the department will be lodging today will again delay the process further.
The South African government which wants to use STB local manufacturing as a job creation tool, forced STB control to be added so that boxes can be turned off with the conditional access system. South Africa is the only country in the world where public television under a DTT dispensation with have STB control.
The South African government went further:, but the South African government went further: unilaterally assuming responsibility for giving STB control over public television channels such as those from the SABC and e.tv, to the state-owned signal distributor Sentech.
Now the department of communications will appeal the court verdict, and it would see that the department feels that the government is entitled to assign who control the encryption system and process because the department and the government will be subsidising some of the manufacturing cost of the STB's for some of the "poorest of the poor" TV households in the country.
"The department of communications has decided to appeal the court decision to grant e.tv, SABC and free-to-air broadcasters control of the conditional access [system] in the state-sponsored set top boxes," says the department of communications.
"The decision was taken after considering the implications of the judgement on other broadcasters, particularly potential broadcasters, in line with the Broadcasting Digital Migration Policy."
"The appeal will be lodged today," says the department of communications. "The department is also consulting with existing broadcasters and the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) on the role of each party in the implementation of the conditional access as per the court judgement."
