All the existing South African broadcasters have seen their originally allocated space of digital spectrum, constantly being whittled away with every new set of draft digital migration regulations constantly being issued and later reissued by the Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa).
Icasa, far behind on creating and finally solidifying the regulatory framework into law of the country's digital terrestrial television dispensation for the TV broadcasting industry, held another hearing on the frequency migration plans yesterday. South African broadcasters - both the SABC as public broadcaster as well as commercial broadcasters such as the free-to-air e.tv and the pay-TV broadcaster M-Net, and fledgling community TV stations across the country have rallied against the proposed changes.
They're hugely concerned that Icasa has not adequately addressed the implications of frequency migration, as well as numerous other DTT issues in South Africa. South Africa is supposed to switch, but is very far behind, from analogie broadcasting to digital broadcasting, a process known as digital migration.
South African broadcasters are particularly concerned at the absence of any policy inquiry into the future needs of terrestrial broadcasting and the implications for the business.
"A major concern is that Icasa is proposing the large-scale migration of TV broadcasters from the spectrum bands in which they have assignments without having considered the future spectrum needs of the TV industry or compensation for affected broadcasters".
"Free-to-air broadcasters face the prospect of losing highly valuable spectrum without being compensated. Without defined entitlements after analogue switch-off, broadcasters will be thrown into an environment where they are unable to explore additional services such as HD, 3D and compete against TV-like services delivered over new technologies," says Marcel Golding.
"e.tv continues to support the migration to DTT, as it will offer a variety of new and exciting services," sayasys the broadcaster, "but e.tv is of the view that, following analogue switch-off, it must be guaranteed at least one full DTT multiplex to replicate its position in the analogue environment."
"For the industry to benefit as a whole, e.tv recommends that Icasa make it clear that the rights of existing analogue broadcasters, insofar as the digital dividend is concerned, will be considered at a later stage in a separate consultative process."
M-Net's Karen Willenberg, the head of regulatory affairs at M-Net told me that e.tv correctly reflects the position which was agreed in the Digital Migration Working Group.
"The working group report stipulates that each migrating broadcaster should be allocated at least one full multiplex in return for the licensed frequencies which they will hand back to Icasa at the end of dual illumination."
"Although this was not possible during dual illumination - because of the limited amount of frequency available - we endorse the view that Icasa must guarantee each migrating broadcaster at least one full multiplex after analogue switch-off. The issue of further spectrum allocations to migrating broacasters should be properly considered and address," says Karen Willenberg.
