by Thinus Ferreira
At the end of August the cast and crew of SABC2's Venda weekday drama series Muvhango - many with families and small and hungry children to feed - once again went unpaid, with the producer, Word of Mouth Pictures that directly blamed the SABC over its failure to pay the production company on time.
In December 2019 production on SABC2's most-watched TV show and South Africa's 4th most-watched TV series abruptly shut down after the SABC failed to pay the cast and crew after 2 months.
Several insiders told TVwithThinus earlier this week that Muvhango is on a 2-week production break but that they were collectively planning to strike if production were to resume since they have yet again not been paid.
A source this week said that "the production has not paid us and they're not saying anything to the cast and crew", and a source said that "people are planning to down tools when we come back because this is honestly unfair".
Another insider said: "How do I tell my hungry, small child that I work for SABC2's biggest show but there's no money to eat or to buy food? Muvhango isn't paying us, saying the SABC didn't pay them".
In an internal memo that Fortune Sithole, CEO at Word of Mouth Pictures, send to staffers on Wednesday and that TVwithThinus has seen, Fortune Sithole said that the production company "extend our apologies for the late communication regarding the payment of salaries".
"Unfortunately our client (SABC) did not pay us for invoices that were due for payment on 31 August 2020 as expected. We have since been in communication with them to resolve the matter and they have promised to do an emergency payment".
"At this stage we are unable to give a definitive timeline, however all salaries will be paid in real-time once payment is received," Fortune Sithole wrote.
On Friday afternoon at 16:10 the SABC in response to a media enquiry from TVwithThinus said that the SABC has now paid Muvhango again on Friday.
"The SABC can confirm that payment to Word of Mouth production was effected today," said Mmoni Seapolelo, SABC spokesperson.
"The corporation has been using relevant channels to communicate with the production house to address this matter and is not in a position to divulge further details on this process, in the public domain."
TVwithThinus asked the SABC earlier why Muvhango wasn't paid when it was supposed to, and asked again after the public broadcaster's response, if it can please say why Word of Mouth was only paid on Friday and why the production company was not paid when it was supposed to.
The SABC didn't respond to the specific question by the time of publication of this report.
ALSO READ: Production shuts down on SABC2's Muvhango after crew and cast goes unpaid by the SABC for 2 months.
