MultiChoice boss Calvo Mawela's full internal memo to staffers on 'void left by seasoned executive' as Showmax CEO Yolisa Phahle steps down and other top exec shuffles.

by Thinus Ferreira

MultiChoice staffers - especially those at Showmax - at shocked at the latest top executive changes the Randburg-based pay-TV operator announced internally late on Friday, which include Showmax CEO Yolisa Phahle stepping down and MultiChoice SA boss Marc Jury now also taking on this responsibility.

MultiChoice insiders are wondering about, and pointing to, what seems like a growing and ongoing lack of leadership and executive succession planning inside MultiChoice City - with especially Yolisa Phahle's exit as Showmax boss raising fears and anxiety levels since the relaunch of MultiChoice's video streamer set for mere months from now in partnership with Comcast's NBCUniversal and Europe's Sky pay-TV division.

News about Yolisa Phahle's exit as Showmax CEO first started circulating last week on Thursday, with MultiChoice staffers who got told in an internal memo on Friday evening.

Collen Dlamini, who was MultiChoice group executive for corporate affairs but who has now been replaced in this position, didn't respond to media queries made about this last week. 

TVwithThinus first asked MultiChoice on Thursday evening about Yolisa Phahle stepping down as Showmax CEO and her resignation. Collen Dlamini on Friday morning told TVwithThinus "to give me an hour and I will get back to you" but didn't.

On Friday afternoon when called again, Collen Dlamini asked for an emailed media query to again be sent and said he would "respond in writing" but never did.

Laura Cooke, Showmax publicist, didn't return calls and didn't respond with answers to a media query around Yolisa Phahle's resignation.

As TVwithThinus reported on Friday, besides MultiChoice SA CEO Marc Jury immediately taking over oversight of Showmax as well from 1 September and Yolisa Phahle providing "advisory support" for a period of 6 months, Collen Dlamini has been replaced by Dr Keabetswe Modimoeng as MultiChoice's new group executive for corporate affairs and stakeholder relations, reporting to MultiChoice CEO Calvo Mawela.

Besides being group exec for corporate affairs, Dr Keabetswe Modimoeng will continue to oversee stakeholder management and regulatory functions for the rest of Africa outside of South Africa.

MultiChoice has also moved up its sport prince to be, Rendani Ramovha's full-time appointment as new SuperSport CEO. Rendani Ramovha who would only have started full-time in the position from 2024 is now SuperSport CEO since 1 September.

Below is the full internal memo MultiChoice CEO Calvo Mawela sent out to staffers on Friday evening:

"I am pleased to announce the following leadership changes effective 1st September 2023.

In what could be characterised as the end of an era defined by a solid career and almost two decades with the Group, it is with mixed emotions to announce that our Showmax CEO, Yolisa Phahle, is making her way into the next chapter of her career.

Discussions have been underway with an understanding that she will be entering the retirement phase of her career in the near future, thus the need for a seamless transition.

Knowing the void that would be left by this seasoned executive, we have been planning a smooth and seamless transition with Yoli for a while. After careful deliberations, we have concluded that Yoli will start a handover process wherein Showmax will report to Marc Jury from 1st September, with Yoli providing full time advisory support to Marc for a period of six months.

From March 2024, Yoli will continue to consult to the Group for a period of 12 months and reporting into Marc. This means that Marc will run Showmax and our South African operations as we continue our search for a new Showmax CEO.

Yoli will be remembered for her unparalleled work since joining M-Net in 2005 as General Manager for Channel O, and later being appointed Channel Director for Local channels SA where she launched the Mzansi Magic portfolio of channels. 

Due to her distinguished work, Yoli was appointed M-Net CEO in 2015. In 2020 Yoli was appointed as CEO for Showmax and having worked with me and the board to set the new direction we wish her the very best of luck as she begins the new episode of her professional life.

Chief Executive Officer for SuperSport

We are pleased to follow up on the initial announcement made earlier this year regarding Rendani Ramovha’s appointment as SuperSport CEO.

On this note please be informed that Rendani will assume his new role from 1st September 2023, reporting to Marc in the interim to ensure a seamless handover of strategic relationships with sporting bodies. 

In his current role as Head of Marketing and Commercial, Rendani has led some exciting initiatives within SuperSport including SuperSport Schools, Super Picks (BetKing and SuperSport partnership) and the SA20 Cricket league.

Group Executive Corporate Affairs and Stakeholder Relations

In order to enhance our Group’s positioning in the industry, and to cement the stakeholder-centric posture of our platform vision, we have decided to make changes in the Corporate Affairs division.

These changes will form part of the broader process of reviewing and repositioning the division going forward. 

Collen Dlamini will step out of the role and provide advisory services on legislative, regulatory and policy effective from 1st September. We wish Collen well in his future endeavors and thank him for his contribution over the years- most notably his role in positioning MultiChoice as the platform of choice as well as his key role in various internal and external programmes.

I am pleased to announce Dr Keabetswe Modimoeng as the new Group Executive Corporate Affairs and Stakeholder Relations, reporting to me. He will continue to oversee the Rest of Africa Stakeholder management and Regulatory functions. 

In his current Corporate Affairs and Stakeholder Relations role within MAH, Kea has in a short space of time proven himself by assisting the business to navigate complex stakeholder issues and forging meaningful partnerships across the continent.

Kea, who is a former Sunday Times award-winning journalist, brings a wealth of experience from both the private and public sectors where he held senior corporate governance, corporate citizenship and public affairs roles across the African continent. 

He holds a PhD in Managerial Sciences from Durban University of Technology, a Senior Executive Fellows programme at Harvard University- and completed an Executive Development Programme at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.

We wish Rendani, Marc and Kea the best as they take on their new responsibilities and gratitude goes to Tex Teixeira who has been diligently holding the fort on the SuperSport front. We look forward to their contributions as we pivot our bold content ambition to fruition.

Regards, Calvo"

ALSO READ: MultiChoice's Showmax CEO Yolisa Phahle resigns - plus other executive changes.

TV CRITIC's NOTEBOOK. How MultiChoice (once again) made a mess of its 2022 DStv price increase announcement as media are desperate for just some type of clarity amidst ongoing communications chaos and confusion.

by Thinus Ferreira

Despite there being at least 3 distinct PR teams specifically working in and at corporate communications, there is clearly chaos, incompetence, or a mix of both, at MultiChoice behind-the-scenes where the pay-TV company can't even send out a straight-forward press release about DStv's annual price increase to the media without issues anymore.

It's February again, which, after decades of covering MultiChoice, is a diary signal to longtime journalists that the pay-TV operator would be announcing its annual DStv price increases again, always coming into effect from April of a year.

Sadly, MultiChoice once again showed very little competence and a lot of eye-rolling amateurism in how it went about doing 2022's DStv price increase announcement.

This is despite MultiChoice having its own internal corporate communications team, and with MultiChoice also paying both the Duma Collective and JR Communications in addition to its permanently employed in-house team to do corporate communications and to deal with the media.

Between having 3 different PR teams MultiChoice's 2022 DStv price increase announcement was (once again) a spectacular mess.

Late on Friday last week after the close of business, media like TVwithThinus were ordered informed that there would be a media roundtable with Simon Camerer, MultiChoice chief operating officer (COO) this week Tuesday about the upcoming price increase. 

With barely any advance notice and less than 2 working days' to plan or to slot it in - while journalists' diaries are constantly already usually full of scheduled interviews and appointments for the next 2 weeks running in an ongoing basis - it was beyond bizarre.

Do people working at MultiChoice in communications really think journalists and media are just sitting around, doing nothing, waiting to hear today that there will be an envelope opened tomorrow? 

Very surely people who communicate professionally for a living, and who work with media are very well aware that as a company you need to schedule media interactions and that two-way communication is crucial.

Bizarrely, this was again a take-it-or-leave-it approach. 

MultiChoice didn't and couldn't be bothered to ask the media whether they could make Tuesday or what day(s) or times would fit them to talk with MultiChoice's about its latest DStv price hike.

This was a Downton Abbey-esque "the king is available for an audience on this day and time and if you want to talk to Simon Camerer you talk to him when we say or not at all".

MultiChoice presumably thinks the media is at its beck and call and that the media needs MultiChoice more than what MultiChoice needs the media when it wants to talk about something.

TVwithThinus had to decline the roundtable because of being unavailable. It's impossible to do an interview or attend something when you're literally flying at that time, on a flight booked for a press event RSVP'ed to weeks earlier, and that MultiChoice knows is happening since DStv people are also attending it.

Asked if there is possibly other availability, MultiChoice said Simon Camerer is busy and can't talk other times or days and isn't available except for Tuesday.

Things got weirder still.

MultiChoice said it would send the updated DStv 2022 price information to media as embargoed information (meaning it can't be revealed, reported or written about yet) before it's officially sent on Tuesday as an email blast, in order for me as a journalist to formulate possible questions since Simon Camerer can't talk except for Tuesday's roundtable talk.

But then MultiChoice failed to do this. MultiChoice didn't send the pricing information, and failed to communicate anything else further around it or the process.

Cue Tuesday morning when somebody either working at MultiChoice's corporate communications division, Duma Collective, or JR Communications send out the email blast DStv price increase press release for 2022.

Who knows where it came from or who issued it - JR Communications?, Duma Collective? MultiChoice itself? - because not all media received it automatically. 

Journalists had to hear from other journalists and other media that "oh, MultiChoice has issued a press release again" and "did you get it? No, did you?".

Once again I had to pick up the phone, taking initiative from my side, to communicate; to call MultiChoice, having to ask if it's possible to please get a press release - a press statement about something that MultiChoice knew I'm interested in, knew I would have wanted to receive automatically, and knew is important.

Why on earth, after decades of covering the same company, every year about the same thing, in 2022, must a journalist still once again call the same said company, once again over the very same thing, once again having to ask for the very same thing? It's very Groundhog Day tiring.

Exhausted media trying to work with MultiChoice are exasperated. Believe me, I hear their sighs as they hear mine.

Few media members still know who is who in the MultiChoice corporate communications and PR team, why there is a JR Communications and a Duma Collective, who exactly is responsible or working on what, who to ask what, and why, between all of them, the end result is that journalists and media are still completely left in the lurch on almost everything when there is something.

Between 3 different PR teams, it's a spectacular failure and indicative of real issues and problems communicating and effectively running a proficient media strategy when, between MultiChoice, the Duma Collective and JR Communications, all the right media who need it, can't get a press release like Idols letting go of judges or DStv price increases when those are issued. And this is just 2022.

Nobody seems to be knowing who exactly is doing and responsible for what.

Is Collen Dlamini who is the group executive for corporate communications at MultiChoice aware of how incredibly frustrating and confusing it is and has become the past two years for journalists who are just trying to effectively interact with the company when it comes to media queries and liaison?

Who does what, exactly? Who do you contact for what at MultiChoice? What does JR Communications do and send out and why? What exactly is Duma Collective's role? What are the contact details and names of whoever, doing whatever? 

What is the contact point(s) for media on what in this never-ending whirlwind of confusion? What's been happening, isn't working, to the detriment of the MultiChoice brand and to the detriment of media unable to effectively do their work. Let's not even start of the confusing disaster for the media that is Bynder.

Somewhere, someone - or teams of people - very urgently need to get a grip and get a handle on the shambles that is MultiChoice communications to the media. The sooner the better. This is a mess and this is not okay.