by Thinus Ferreira
In South Africa, Oprah Winfrey's sensational sit-down TV special with Prince Harry and Meghan that was shown on M-Net (DStv 101) on Monday night 8 March drew 176 104 viewers during its broadcast on the pay-TV channel.
The 2-hour special internationally distributed by ViacomCBS Global Distribution was made available to not just DStv Premium subscribers but also DStv Compact Plus and DStv Compact subscribers and is getting a rebroadcast today, 13 March, at 16:00.
The TV special, fully-titled CBS Presents Oprah with Meghan and Harry will again be available to all three tiers of DStv subscribers.
The special lured 21.3 million viewers over three days in the United States on CBS according to Nielsen and has also surpassed 61 million viewers around the world, CBS said in a ratings press release on Friday.
In the United Kingdom Oprah's interview with The Duke and Duchess of Sussex pulled 11.3 million viewers on ITV, and in Australia the headline-grabbing special had 1.78 million viewers on Network Ten.
South Africa's 176 104 viewers, according to data requested and supplied by the Broadcast Research Council of South Africa (BRCSA), are those who watched the special live and viewing-on-same-day-as-live (VOSDAL) viewers, and doesn't include people who viewed it during its broadcast on DStv online.
A ratings breakout for the rest of Africa isn't available since several African countries don't have or don't accurate TV ratings measurement systems but the special that MultiChoice broadcast across sub-Saharan Africa on DStv in other major markets besides South Africa like Nigeria and Kenya, pulled a combined viewership of close to a million viewers for the programme in Africa.
M-Net told TVwithThinus that CBS Presents Oprah
with Meghan and Harry "reached close to a million viewers across the African continent" but the Randburg-based pay-TV broadcaster didn't provide a specific ratings number or tally methodology.
Since Harpo Productions holds the streaming licensing rights to the interview special it isn't available on DStv Catch Up and has also not been available on any American streaming services.
