Cabinet approves control system for decoders needed for digital broadcasting
A digital switch-on date marking the start of South Africa’s transition from analogue to digital broadcasting will be announced “shortly”, following Cabinet’s approval for a control system for the required set-top boxes (STBs).
Communications Minister Faith Muthambi, who has the responsibility of driving the digital migration process, was also expected to unveil the switch-off date for the analogue signal.
South Africa had until June to switch to digital broadcasting frequencies before the protection was lifted for the analogue terrestrial television signals, leaving frequencies open to disruption.
South Africa’s Cabinet on Thursday approved the Broadcasting Digital Migration Amendment Policy, which had included the control system on the decoders.
This emerged a few days after the National Association of Manufacturers in Electronic Components president Keith Thabo argued that the adoption of the much-disputed conditional access required to intercept digital broadcasting frequencies would delay the process further and hike the cost of the subsidised units.
The inclusion of a conditional access in the control system was expected to increase the unit price of the STBs by between $9 and $12 each – adding more than R450-million at the lower end to government’s R4-billion bill for five-million subsidised decoders.
However, it was not clear whether the use of the control system would be nonmandatory outside of the STB’s supplied by government, as decided by former Communications Minister Yunus Carrim in 2013.
It was also not clear whether or not government still intended to subsidise 66% of the price of a digital terrestrial television STB and up to 77% of the price of direct-to-home STBs to five-million of South Africa’s poorest households, or foot 100% of the cost of the decoders as indicated in a post-Cabinet meeting statement on Thursday.
The policy, when published, would “clearly define” the control system, Cabinet said.
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