by Thinus Ferreira
SABC2 has cancelled Pasella after 23 years and 28 seasons, confirming that the longrunning Afrikaans lifestyle magazine show won't be back after the latest season.
Pasella weathered multiple day and timeslot changes over numerous years on SABC2 and was a yearlong show with weekly episodes until the SABC2 changed it to shorter, broken-up seasons in 2013 after 15 years.
Pasella started in March 1998 on SABC2 when Pieter Cilliers Productions began the series as a studio-based show. Filmmedia took over production a year later in 1999 and then Tswelopele Productions got the contract in 2001.
Amor Engelbrecht was the longrunning producer of Pasella until she left and started her Media Club production company producing series for Media24's VIA (DStv 147) channel.
The final current season of Pasella on Wednesdays at 19:30 will be a "tribute season", meeting up with some of the presenters from previous years and showing the history of the series, along with everyone who had a role in creating and producing the series, including veteran Pasella crew and staff behind-the-scenes.
Maritha Greenland, SABC2 commissioning editor, says Pasella will end with a final episode that will be a wrap party, called a "Pasella party" to "give the show a proper, heartfelt goodbye".
The current crop of Pasella presenters are Paul Rothmann, Vicky Davis, Amalia Uys, Hemelbesem, Rumacques Gelderbloem and Sasha-Lee Davids.
Pasella is produced by Tswelopele Productions with Patience Stevens and Basetsana Kumalo as executive producers, with the company that was a powerhouse producer for SABC content for decades.
SABC3 cancelled Top Billing, also produced by Tswelopele Productions in October 2019 after 27 years after the South African public broadcaster could no longer afford the luxury lifestyle show.
Gerhard Pretorius, SABC2 channel head, said Pasella over the years was very good at adapting with how television changed.
"The decision has been a hard one, but it is necessary with the new schedule introduced in April this year, aimed at diversifying SABC 2’s Afrikaans magazine offering," he said.
"This will also enable the channel to showcase different stories which represent the diversity of our nation and offer more opportunities for independent producers to bring their creative works to the channel."
The axing of Pasella is part of the ongoing restructuring of SABC2's linear schedule to replace old programmes with fading ratings with new on-air properties that could hopefully lure more viewers back to the channel.
SABC2 recently cut down both 7de Laan and Muvhango to just 3 episodes per week because of sagging ratings to slowly try and introduce other programming in the timeslots to see if the replacement series can attract higher viewership.
The final Pasella episode will be broadcast in January 2022.
