Telecommunications and Postal Services Minister Dr Siyabonga Cwele
South Africa’s digital migration ambitions have regained some momentum as Telecommunications and Postal Services Minister Dr Siyabonga Cwele on Wednesday promised to deliver the long-awaited Broadcasting Digital Migration (BDM) policy by the end of July, as well as to table a new date for the “digital switch-on” within the next three months.
South Africa has suffered several migration delays and many false starts since a 2006 agreement with the International Telecommunications Union to migrate from an analogue to a digital television broadcasting signal by the middle of 2015.
“There is no doubt that our digital migration process has faced many challenges. The June 2015 deadline looms before us and we dare not let our people down,” Cwele said during his Budget Vote speech in Parliament.
The final BDM policy would now be gazetted by the newly formed department, which had a ring-fenced budget of R2.97-billion for the transition, at end of this month.
A new date to switch on the digital signal would also allow the industry, manufacturers and television-owning households to “prepare accordingly” as consumers would need to buy and install the yet-to-be-manufactured set-top boxes.