The Department of Communications' (DoC's) gazette of the proposed amendment of the Broadcasting Digital Migration Policy on Friday signalled a possible gain in traction for South Africa’s digital migration ambitions, as a digital signal switch-on date of April 1 is targeted.

The amendments, which were out for public comment for the next 30 days, indicated that, after several years of delays and many false starts, the nation’s move from analogue broadcasting to digital terrestrial television (DTT) was back on track.

“The time to migrate to a digital broadcasting system has inevitably arrived. We need to embrace it because it is a major step in improving our people’s lives, and I sincerely hope that this policy is a bold step in our quest to achieve that goal. The looming switch-on date requires us to work at the speed of light, consistent with our business unusual strategy to enhance the benefits of the digital television to all our people,” Communications Minister Yunus Carrim said in the document.

This followed Cabinet’s approval on Wednesday for the use of a control system in subsidised set-top boxes (STBs), which would be required to receive terrestrial broadcasting transmission signals after the analogue broadcasting frequencies’ exclusivity, or protection, was lifted in June 2015.

The STB impasse between broadcasters was the latest of many challenges government faced in the delivery of DTT since committing to the International Telecommunications Union’s deadline of June 17, 2015.

South Africa’s self-imposed deadline to switch on the digital signal in November 2008 and switch off the analogue signal in November 2011 – allowing for a three-year analogue and digital dual-illumination period – proved unrealistic.

Multiple Ministerial changes, delays in transmission tower upgrades and a 2010 STB technical standard adoption review, as well as amended Broadcasting Digital Migration Policy and DTT regulations requiring public consultation, hampered the digital roll-out, resulting in further delaying the digital switch-on from a new date of April 2012 to September.

The DoC’s October 2012 soft launch in the Northern Cape was meant to be followed by a nationwide commercial launch in December last year, but this was delayed for another year, owing to a legal dispute between the DoC and free-to-air broadcaster e.tv regarding the STBs.

Carrim would decide on the new switch-off date for analogue transmission after engaging Cabinet and other relevant stakeholders.