Disney+ SA launches a MTN mobile plan.

by Thinus Ferreira

The Walt Disney Company Africa is launching a limited mobile plan with MTN for Disney+ in South Africa at R49 per month.

Walt Disney's promo partnership with MTN in South Africa follows Vodacom's promo partnership with Amazon Prime Video and comes as global streamers like Netflix and Apple TV+ are furiously fighting for sign-ups in Africa's most developed streamer market where MultiChoice is also set to relaunch its Showmax offering at the end of the year in partnership with Comcast's NBCUniversal.

MTN mobile subscribers who add Disney+ to their monthly bill or pay for it with airtime get 500MB of free data for streaming per month. A Disney+ mobile "entertainment pass" is also available at a cost of R59 for 2GB of streaming use data per month.

MTN and Disney+ SA's mobile plan is more limited than the normal Disney+ subscription of R139 per month, limiting a user to a single concurrent stream compared to the four of a normal subscription. 

Only two devices can be logged into and use a Disney+ mobile-only subscription concurrently, compared to 10 for a normal Disney+ subscription, and Disney+ on the mobile plan doesn't allow Apple AirPlay or screencasting. 

Content quality is capped at 480p for MTN's Disney+ mobile plan (as opposed to 4K or Ultra-HD of 2160p for Disney+ at R139.

"Plans are in development for further Disney+ offers for MTN customers," the companies said in a joint statement on Thursday.

Jason Probert, MTN SA general manager for digital services, says "We are proud to enter into this agreement with Disney+ as we collaborate to offer South Africans world-class entertainment on the go".

Christine Service, senior vice president and general manager of The Walt Disney Company, says "Disney+ joining forces with MTN gives South African subscribers another way to access our vast selection of blockbuster films, iconic series and brand-new Disney+ Original titles at home or on the move, giving more streaming choices than ever before".

BBC Studios launches ad-free BBC Kids in South Africa with MTN at a cost of R25 per month.

by Thinus Ferreira

BBC Studios is launching BBC Kids in South Africa in partnership with Switchmedia and MTN, where it will be accessible to MTN customers as paid-content through a daily, weekly or monthly subscription fee.

BBC Kids can be downloaded from the Google Play Store or the MTN Play Portal with BBC Kids which comes with a subscription fee of R5 per day, R15 per week or R25 per month.

BBC Kids carries award-winning BBC children's programming, curated according to age. BBC Kids has specific sections aimed at pre-school children and another for older primary school children.

For younger viewers, BBC Kids has series like Hey Duggee, Sarah & Duck, JoJo & Gran Gran, Yakka Dee and Swashbuckle, while older kids up to age 12 can watch Jamie Johnson and Harry Potter: A History of Magic, The Bagel and Becky Show, educational series like Horrible Histories and comedy like Gangsta Granny.

The BBC Kids app contains more than 100 hours of content for kids ages 12 and younger at launch.

"Switchmedia is thrilled to join forces with BBC Kids and MTN to bring safe, ad-free, education and entertainment to families across South Africa," says Mark Johns, Switchmedia CEO.

"Built using our award-winning MediaHQ solution, the dynamic new BBC Kids app features nearly 200 hours of content, a clean, easy to navigate interface and programme recommendations."

Nick Percy, BBC Studios president of global markets, says "BBC Kids provides parents with a go-to, trusted destination for award-winning children's programming that can be accessed anytime, anywhere. With inspiring, educational and exciting shows for preschoolers and older children at their fingertips, BBC Kids will be a welcome addition for families in South Africa".

BBC Studios' linear TV channel for pre-school children CBeebies (DStv 306) is carried on MultiChoice's DStv satellite pay-TV service in South Africa and across sub-Saharan Africa.

Coronavirus: ICASA says DStv and StarSat pay-TV must be made free and Vodacom and MTN must give cheap or free mobile data during the Covid-19 pandemic.

by Thinus Ferreira

With the rapid increase of the Covid-19 novel coronavirus in South Africa as society is increasingly hunkering down, South Africa's broadcasting regulator ICASA says it is asking mobile operators and pay-TV services to give people free DStv and free or cheap data.

The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa wants MultiChoice and StarSat to give away their pay-TV services for free to South Africans during the coronavirus pandemic and for mobile operators like Vodacom, MTN and Cell C to give people free data so that they can communicate and stay informed.

ICASA in a statement says that there is expected to be a "surge in usage of data as the majority of South Africans across all sectors have no option but work from home, learn from home and carry on their day to day life activities (for instance shopping, entertainment) from home through technological means".

"This will result in a spike in data usage, particularly as consumers also access information with regards to the pandemic – thus placing strain on the capacity of networks."

Dr Keabetswe Modimoeng, ICASA acting chairperson, says ICASA is requesting all network service providers in the telecommunications industry to "heed the call to enable the country to mitigate the spread of Covid-19 by facilitating easy and affordable and/or free access to data".

"In this regard ICASA is engaging the sector on possible ways of radio frequency spectrum relief for the duration of the declared state of disaster to ease congestion, ensure good quality of broadband services, and enable licensees to lower cost of access to consumers, particularly in relation to education, emergency and other social services."

In terms of broadcasting Dr Keabetswe Modimoeng says that all broadcasting services are required to make Public Service Announcements (PSAs) about the Covid-19 virus in the public interest, but that over and above this that pay-TV providers like MultiChoice and StarTimes/StarSat "have been requested to open both their audio and television bouquets to consumers that do not subscribe to their services".

"This will assist the public to have access to information that they can use to deal with the scourge of the virus that is facing the country."

Is MultiChoice Africa getting sold off to MTN? MultiChoice won't comment on it but confirms that it is in discussions with MTN regarding content.

MultiChoice says it won't comment as speculation swirls regarding the pay-TV service's African division that could possibly be sold to MTN.

Rumours abound that Naspers is possibly looking at offloading MultiChoice Africa - the division of its pay-TV service arm outside of South Africa - to the cellular operator MTN.

In response to a media enquiry asking MultiChoice if MultiChoice Africa is possibly being spun-off and if it could potentially be sold off, MultiChoice says it won't confirm or deny that.

MultiChoice says it is currently in discussions with MTN regarding a content supply agreement.

MultiChoice further says "it is our company policy to neither acknowledge nor deny our involvement in any merger, acquisition or divestiture activity, nor to comment on market rumours".

With several African countries's economies under severe pressure, MultiChoice Africa has come under similar pressure the past two years in several African nations - most notably Nigeria - where depreciating currencies have had a debilitating impact on content and operational costs, and has had a sharp negative impact on the pay-TV operator's revenue.

DAILY TV NEWS ROUND-UP. Today's interesting TV stories to read from TVwithThinus - 23 February 2017.

Here's the latest news about TV that I read, and that you should too:

■ Nigerian "invasion" planned on South African companies MultiChoice and MTN on Thursday.
Public protests want to "stampede" MultiChoice Nigeria and MTN in Lagos on Thursday because of xenophobic attacks in South Africa.

■ Take a guess how many TV news channels there are in India?
Almost 400! And now a new TV news channel RepublicTV launching soon wants to enter the competition.

■ BBC will start a new TV channel for Scotland in 2018.
BBC Scotland will focus on drama and factual content and an hour-long news programme.


■ British mumbling mars BBC's latest TV series SS-GB.
Viewers are once again complaining that they can't hear properly. This time its the new alt-history series SS-GB starting soon on BBC First (DStv 119) in South Africa.
Is the problem new flat-screen TV sets?

Meanwhile SS-GB has "cliched, clunky, dialogue delivered at a snail's pace".
The BBC says it will again look at what's wrong after all of the sound complaints.
More than 1.5million viewers of the 7 million who started watching the drama series that used the wrong model of Spitfire,  tuned away amidst the BBC "mumbling row".
The TV is hard to hear, says The Wall Street Journal, but you can fix that.


■ Spanish TV gossip shows
violated the rights of a singer by discussing her sex life on the private TV channels, the European Court of Human Rights finds.

■ This is Us is now American television's biggest hit.
Yet its nowhere in South Africa, not on M-Net (DStv 101), not on DStv, e.tv or anywhere else. Vanity Fair has the story on how the great emoti-drama in which "nice people really like each other" dethroned The Big Bang Theory.

■ Pakistan TV drama in trouble over the lesbians.
Pakistan's media regulator tells Hum TV the "topic of homosexuality is against our values" after two women are shown being in a relationship.

■ Turkish TV dramas are slowly conquering the world.
The Turkish delights are apparently even responsible for a less fighting in Gaza during the afternoons.

■ Something for 7de Laan?
Perhaps an idea for SABC2's viewership shedding soap? Australia's soap Home and Away sees rating spikes with stories about hunks caring for babies.

■ China's relaunched CGTN (DStv 409 / StarSat 266) apologises for wrong Somaliland map.
"Terribly sorry" for Somalia map bungle, says wrong Africa map "was a mistake by one of our editors and does not in any way reflect the standpoint of the Chinese government".

■ Shock in Brazil as TV channel reveals dancer will have to wear clothes
for the first time in 26 years on TV Globo's coverage of upcoming Rio Carnival.

■ American pay-TV boss warns:
Pay-TV subscribers are going to continue to flee if traditional pay-TV services "continue to raise prices and continue to have 16 to 18 minutes of advertising per hour".

■ Don't cry for the laugh track.
Inside the morbid secret of one of the classic TV sitcom's most annoying tools.

■ Study finds millennial men are abandoning pay-TV in droves.
Young guys are not just no longer paying for television, they're simply quitting watching TV.

■ An American rightwinger says he has "tapes" about CNN and will release it on Thursday.
Says he has a "few hundreds hours" of material recorded inside CNN that he will release as "CNN Leaks".

■ A whopping number of pay-TV channels - 127 - in India are showing too much ads.
Who knew a rule capping ads on a pay-TV channel to 12 minutes per hour existed somewhere in the world?
Several Indian TV channels also seen in South Africa went way over the prescribed 12 minute cap, like B4U Movies, SUN TV, Star Plus, Colors, SET Max.

MTN and Discovery Digital's MTN VU video-on-demand service struggling; MTN admits the underperforming MTN VU isn't working as envisioned.

MTN and Discover Digital's video-on-demand service MTN VU is struggling and has been underperforming - the latest South African VOD service to admit that the roll-out of its streaming service is not yielding results and not working as envisioned.

After Altron's disastrous Altech Node abruptly shut down after a year and Times Media's VIDI tanked, MTN VU is the latest South African VOD service admitting trouble and a tepid uptake under users.

MTN VU, the rebranded service that originally launched as MTN FrontRow and quietly changed in December 2015, primarily competes in South Africa with Naspers' ShowMax, PCCW Global's ONTAPtv.com, and Netflix South Africa.

MTN announced its bad financial results today that included a profit plunge - the cellular operator continues to be hammered by ongoing major trouble in Nigeria and other problems and challenges capping a terrible year for the company it calls "one of the most difficult in its history".

MTN says MTN VU is performing below expectations which is troubling for the company. It signals yet another radical shake-up soon for its struggling video-on-demand service.

MTN meanwhile hopes to get a new CEO in the second part of 2016.

'THE MENACE OF MULTICHOICE': Nigeria ramps up its hate towards MultiChoice; senate orders a probe, slams DStv service over 'unhealthy and unwholesome practices'.

The public hatred towards MultiChoice in Nigeria is building with the Nigerian senate that has now also politically spewed venomous outrage at the satellite pay-TV platform, slamming "the menace of MultiChoice" for apparent "arbitrary DStv price hikes" and calling the company out for what it calls unhealthy and "unwholesome practices".

Just days after MultiChoice Nigeria was slammed by that country's Consumer Protection Council (CPC) and ordered to effect multiple changes to its services, refund DStv subscribers and change how it structures channels in various DStv packages, the Nigerian government also slammed DStv in its senate.

The CPC in October 2015 raided MultiChoice Nigeria's head office, a subsidiary of the South African based MultiChoice Africa, and seized computers as journalists looked on.

Later in October Nigerian censorship through its National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) forced MultiChoice and Discovery Networks International to pull a transgender teen documentary series from the TLC Entertainment (DStv 172) channel which impacted the entire Africa and prevented the whole continent from seeing the show since the channel has only one feed to the continent.

In a motion tabled on Wednesday in the Nigerian senate entitled "Concern on unwholesome practices by MultiChoice Nigeria", the Nigerian government now has MultiChoice as that country's dominant pay-TV operator in its cross-hairs and said it's going to probe the operator and what it labelled "the menace of MultiChoice".

MultiChoice's Nigerian troubles follow after cellphone operator MTN was slammed with a massive fine in the West African country, and clothing retailer Truworths closed up shop over draconian regulations and foreign exchange controls it said was making it virtually impossible for the South African retailer to do continue to do business in that African country.

On Wednesday the deputy senate leader Ibu Na'Allah slammed MultiChoice Nigeria in the senate motion, saying DStv "must not be allowed to take what is not due to them irrespective of where they operate" and that "Nigerians must be protected on the way and manner people operate their business in this country".

Senator Isa Misau leading the motion on Wednesday and constantly referring to MultiChoice as "a menace", slammed MultiChoice Nigeria for refusing to adopt a pay-as-you-go model, saying MultiChoice frequently gets loads of subscriber complaints, and is abusing DStv subscribers through consumer rights' violations.

Nigeria's committees on Information and Trade and Investment were ordered to now also investigate MultiChoice Nigeria in Wednesday's motion, to have public hearings, and to report back over four weeks.

Isa Misau said MultiChoice, due to its dominance of the Nigerian satellite pay-TV market, is busy with "negative and unhealthy practices".

On Tuesday this week MultiChoice Nigeria suddenly slashed DStc Explora prices and made the English Premier League (EPL) and La Liga available to DStv Compact subscribers in that country.

On Monday Nigeria's CPC ordered MultiChoice Nigeria to unlock free-to-air channels to make these channels watchable on the DStv system even if people are no longer DStv subscribers.

The CPC also ordered MultiChoice to provide toll-free call centre numbers to its clients and that MultiChoice Nigeria must pay DStv subscribers compensation for lost viewing time.

The CPC said MultiChoice Nigeria must make sport and other "good channels" available on all DStv packages and not just on DStv Premium as "part of a "reasonable, equitable spread".

The CPC found that MultiChoice Nigeria's DStv service agreement that subscribers must sign is "grossly unfair, unjust and one-sided" and said MultiChoice needs to redraft and change it and resubmit it to the consumer protection body.

The CPC also says MultiChoice Nigeria's billing system is not in the best interest of consumers. The CPC ordered MultiChoice Nigeria to "install a billing system that ensures billing starts with the provision of service".

The CPC also ordered MultiChoice Nigeria to give DStv subscribers the option within 180 days to temporarily suspend their subscriptions "when subscribers are otherwise unable to enjoy their service on account of being away for a limited period of time".

These "service suspensions" should be for between 7 to 14 days (a week to two weeks), and DStv subscribers should be able to make use of it twice a year with a 72-hour notice period to MultiChoice.

MultiChoice was also ordered to pay out compensation to subscribers within 90 days across the board to DStv subscribers who "over time lost legitimate and paid viewing time by its conduct of not restoring service contemporaneously after payment, as well as other instances of disruptions".

The CPC also ordered MultiChoice Nigeria's call centres to be open and operate for longer hours during public holidays and over weekends.

The ramped up consumer body sanctions and political rhetoric against MultiChoice comes as the 4th AfricaMagic Viewers' Choice Awards (AMVCAs) is set to take place in  Lagos, Nigeria hosted by Minnie Dlamini and the Nigerian IK Osakioduwa.

The AfricaMagic Viewers' Choice Awards is an initiative by M-Net, that supplies the various AfricaMagic channels to MultiChoice's DStv, to celebrate, recognise and improve the reputation of Nigerian and African films and again has MultiChoice as one of the sponsors this year.

Nigeria slams MultiChoice for over DStv service; orders compensation, 'equitable' spread of TV channels, toll-free call centre numbers, billing system changes.

Nigeria's consumer protection body has once again slammed MultiChoice in its ongoing investigation into the satellite pay-TV platform's services ordering MultiChoice Nigeria to make massive and eye-popping service and structural product adjustments that might have far-reaching consequences for MultiChoice's DStv service elsewhere on the Africa continent.

Nigeria's ThisDay newspaper reports today that Nigeria's Consumer Protection Council (CPC) has found MultiChoice Nigeria guilty of violating consumer rights.

The CPC ordered MultiChoice Nigeria to unlock free-to-air channels to make these channels watchable on the DStv system even if people are no longer DStv subscribers and that MultiChoice should "put services on hold" when DStv subscribers are away from home and ask the company to temporarily suspend their service.

The CPC also ordered MultiChoice to provide toll-free call centre numbers to its clients; that MultiChoice Nigeria must pay DStv subscribers compensation for lost viewing time; and that popular sport and other popular channels only available on the DStv Premium package must be made available across all DStv packages as part of a "reasonable, equitable spread".

The CPC found that MultiChoice Nigeria's DStv service agreement that subscribers must sign is "grossly unfair, unjust and one-sided" and said MultiChoice needs to redraft and change it and resubmit it to the consumer protection body.

The CPC says MultiChoice Nigeria can't block people's access to free-to-air TV channels once they are no longer DStv subscribers and that the pay-TV operator must release these channels to viewers who want to keep watching free television when they no longer have a DStv subscription.

The CPC also says MultiChoice Nigeria's billing system is not in the best interest of consumers. The CPC ordered MultiChoice Nigeria to "install a billing system that ensures billing starts with the provision of service".

The CPC also ordered MultiChoice Nigeria to give DStv subscribers the option within 180 days to temoprarily suspend their subscriptions "when subscribers are otherwise unable to enjoy their service on account of being away for a limited period of time".

These "service suspensions" should be for between 7 to 14 days (a week to two weeks), and DStv subscribers should be able to make use of it twice a year with a 72-hour notice period to MultiChoice.

MultiChoice was also ordered to pay out compensation to subscribers within 90 days across the board to DStv subscribers who "over time lost legitimate and paid viewing time by its conduct of not restoring service contemporaneously after payment, as well as other instances of disruptions".


'Good TV channels for all DStv packages'
In another order that might be difficult or impossible for MultiChoice Nigeria to carry out, the CPC ordered the pay-TV operator to ensure that all DStv bouquets get an "equatable share" of sport and other good TV channels.

MultiChoice Nigeria has 90 days to "ensure a reasonably equitable spread of popular sports and other channels hitherto concentrated in its DStv Premium bouquet over all available bouquets".

The CPC also ordered MultiChoice Nigeria to set-up and maintain local, toll-free customer care telephone numbers for MultiChoice call centres - and in addition MultiChoice's call centres will have to be open and operate for longer hours during public holidays and over weekends.

MultiChoice Nigeria was also ordered to "develop a Customer Care Manual which shall contain mechanisms to address customer complaints in an accurate, friendly, timely, efficient, courteous and honest manner".

Cellular operator MTN is battling a protracted legal battle in Nigeria over a massive consumer telecommunications regulatory fine.

Last week South Africa's Truworths said it has shut down its shops in Nigeria over draconian regulations and foreign exchange controls making it virtually impossible for the South African retailer to do continue to do business in that African country.

Yet another video-on-demand (VOD) service for South Africa, VuClip, launching as early as next week from China's PCCW.

Yet another video-on-demand (VOD) service will be launching soon in South Africa - very likely the orange VuClip this one from China's PCCW.

Bloomberg reports today that a new VOD service is likely to launch as early as next week as a rival to Naspers' ShowMax.

It's highly likely that its called VuClip.

The news comes a day after Viacom announced that its Viacom Play Plex video-on-demand app service will launch globally in the 4th quarter of this year and will also be available in South Africa with content from Nickelodeon, MTV, BET and Comedy Central.

With Viacom Play Plex, ShowMax, the Times Media Group's VIDI, MTN's FrontRow and PCCW's as yet unnamed service, it means that the VOD market in South Africa is quickly hotting up and getting crowded.

It's not clear what content PCCW's unnamed VOD service will launch with but it won't be as extensive or carry the large range of recent and premium titles as ShowMax which has shown up the rights to hot content like Game of Thrones and a lot other premium television for months.

PCCW, owned by the Hong Kong billionaire Richard Li, will roll out the new VOD service as early as next week, Bloomberg reports.

PCCW has a majority stake in the mobile VOD service Vuclip and has aggressive plans to grow and take Vuclip into new markets, including Africa.

PCCW's VOD service has a vast catalogue of mostly Asian centric content - primarily Bollywood movies, but also Bollywood movies, shows and music videos.

The service has content in 25 languages, including English, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Indonesian Bahasa, Arabic, Malay and Thai which wouldn't be applicable for African and South African audiences.

Weber Shandwick's South African office is the PR company for PCCW Global in South Africa and last week send out an invitation - but only to some journalists covering the TV and IT industry and ignoring several - for the launch event next week of a new video-on-demand service.

It's already leaving journalists wondering where's the communication and who is supposed to talk about PCCW's new product - and why details are already leaking, just like what happened with ShowMax last month - way ahead of the media event and service launch that Weber Shandwick is supposedly organising.

SHOWTIME FOR SHOWMAX: Naspers' ShowMax officially launches in South Africa, 'we're aiming to change the game,' says boss John Kotsaftis.

Naspers officially launched its new streaming subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) service ShowMax on Wednesday afternoon at its brand-new South Africa headquarters in Greenstone House in the Stonemill Office Park in Randburg.

ShowMax Premium that costs R99 per month unlimited access and with ShowMax Basic for free with a limited number of free content available, will be competition for Naspers' pay-TV division MIH's MultiChoice which runs the DStv satellite pay-TV service.

ShowMax - managed by John Kotsaftis as the general manager, and who was the CEO of DStv Digital Media until he left mid-2014 - is however aiming to create a foothold and commercial market presence in the South Africa's new but growing SVOD market before the arrival of the global over-the-top (OTT) streaming operator, Netflix which will be its real competition in the market segment.

ShowMax will now also be competing with other VOD services such as MTN's FrontRow costing R119 and Times Media Group's VIDI that announced on Wednesday - the same day as ShowMax' launch, that its teamed up with Samsung to bring a streaming Smart TV app to Samsung TV sets.

ShowMax now has the biggest selection of SVOD content in South Africa of all operators and subscribers who get a  7-day free trial, can access the service through internet browsers or on tablets and smartphones through the ShowMax app.

ShowMax raided - and Naspers allowed it - top MultiChoice and M-Net talent like Victor Eckard who was the director of general entertainment at M-Net and who is now the head of content at ShowMax, and industry heavy-weights like Richard Boorman, formerly at Vodacom.

ShowMax is launching with 750 TV series, 850 complete seasons, with more than 19 000 individual episodes and a total viewing time of more than 11 000 hours - content adding up to more than a year's continuous viewing of series, movies, documentaries, kids shows and classic programming from the vaults of the SABC.

"This is just the beginning," said John Kotsaftis. "We are going to grow this platform and adapt it based on what people want to watch", saying ShowMax is a "long-term investment for Naspers".

"This is where the world is going to and we want to be there and grow with it. ShowMax brings customers two unique benefits - a library many multiples larger than those currently available through local services and also African content not available through services originating outside the continent."

"We're unashamedly ambitious in what we're aiming to achieve with ShowMax," says John Kotsaftis.

"The ongoing change in viewing habits has given us the opportunity to build a video-on-demand powerhouse to feed the marathon viewing trend."

"We've got the best content from Hollywood and beyond, but at the same time we also have the local content that consumers here expect. Importantly, we're bringing this in at an attractive price, and doing this across more devices than ever before," says John Kotsaftis.

"We're aiming to change the game. ShowMax won't just be the best subscription video-on-demand service available in South Africa - we're competing with the best in the world."

Nigeria threatens South Africa with a boycott against MultiChoice's DStv, MTN, over arms deal scandal payment seizure.

Nigeria is threatening South Africa with a boycott of South African companies and brands like MultiChoice's DStv and MTN if the an arms deal scandal is not resolved soon which saw the South African govermment freeze a $5.7 million transaction.

According to AFP an official of Nigeria's National Security Advisor (NSA) said that $5.7 million in a deal brokered by a South African firm had been frozen by the South African government after it was transferred to the South African firm.

The Nigerian National Security Advisor made a thinly veiled threat that there will be retaliation in Nigerian against big companies like MultiChoice and MTN operating in Nigeria if the arms deal scandal is not resolved.

"You cannot be making so much money from Nigeria and then turn around and embarrass the people," the Nigerian NSA official said, denying any wrongdoing in the transaction.

"We want to state clearly that a business transaction actually took place between a legitimate company in Nigeria and another legitimate one in South Africa through the bank," said the advisor, mentioning how Nigeria has provided "a beneficial environment for South African companies like MTN, DStv and a host of others to do business unhindered."

"It is hope that South Africa would reciprocate this noble gesture," the advisor said.

According to City Press, South Africa's Asset Forfeiture Unit of the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) says the money was the proceed of illegal transactions.

IN VOGUE. The faux news anchor and news desk (remains) a popular go-to advertising TV trope on South African television.

The authority figure telling you it is so "because I say so", the mimicry of the news values of credibility, importance and newness, and the heightened sense of urgency and call to action remain the reasons why South African companies keep co-opting and using the traditional news anchor and the milieu of the news anchor desk as the setting for their TV commercials.

Two South African cellular companies, Cell C as well as MTN, are running concurrent TV advert marketing campaigns using news anchor characters talking about their services.
 

While the news anchor desk setting isn't new as a TV trope, the way the anchor desk is projected is keeping up with the times and incorporating subtle changes.

They now come complete with rolling "news" scrolls, and where the backdrop in the background used to be static, it's now often filled with people or working people (as both these ads are), helping to aid the illusion of supposed greater "transparency" in a post-modernistic world.

The news anchor's rigid formalism - symbolised through their formal attire - is getting more relaxed (self-evident in the growing absence of the traditional tie which is forsaken for an open collar or bow-tie).

Blue (red is the other colour but interestingly not employed in this case by either Cell C or MTN - possibly since their competitor Vodacom is red) still remains the symbolic best tone from the colour palette to convey breaking news in the real world (and in mock adverts) when the news needs to be underscored with a sense of lofty yet authoritative credibility.

FIRST LOOK! VOD.TV to deliver 150 hours of television per month without the need of a cellphone as SouthTel plans launch for early 2012.

SouthTel that's currently in a trial phase with MTN as I told you RIGHT HERE for its video-on-demand (VOD) TV satellite service will be rolling out there service with this HD decoder - and will have 150 hours of television per month on offer when it launches early in the new year.

I can also reveal that SouthTel is now looking at early 2012 for its commercial launch which would initially have been in August 2011. SouthTel decided to postpone after MultiChoice's VOD hiccups with DStv BoxOffice in July.

And besides your first look at the VOD.TV decoder above, here is your first look at the VOD.TV remote control on the right.

Where the current DStv remote control has 5 colour buttons, the VOD.TV decoder will have a remote control with 4 coloured square buttons in red, green, yellow and blue. Similar to DStv Box Office, VOD.TV will cycle some of the content monthly.

Unlike DStv BoxOffice, the VOD.TV decoder will be connected to the internet, so subscribers won't need a cellphone. Subscribers and users will refresh and top up their accounts through the TV interface of the VOD.TV decoder, SouthTel now says on its website.