MultiChoice promises local content for SADC nations
Mr Nkateko Mabaso, Director for local interest Channels in South Africa, explaining to SADC journalists, MultiChoice’s plan to showcase more southern-African films and music on its channels. (Photograph by Mandisa Rasmeni)
During the visit, Nkateko Mabaso, Director for local interest Channels in South Africa, M-Net interacted with the media from the different countries and announced that the company is busy with a plan for SADC nations to have more of their local content being aired on MultiChoice.
He said that MultiChoice will be focusing on making content relevant to the regions but it must be commercially viable, therefore if their project does not yield any money from the programmes they introduce in the SADC nations, they will not air them. He advised artists to send in their music videos as well as films so that they can assess them to see if they are viable.
Mabaso was grilled by the SADC journalists on the fact that Multichoice is only concentrating on South Africa and Nigeria, even though there is a lot of talent within the other southern-African countries. Mabaso explained that they already have content that caters for east Africa hence the shift in focus to other southern-African countries.Mabaso told the journalists that, they believe that local content is king and that they have authentic content and almost N$1 billion has been spent. Journalists also complained that southern-African films and music are popular overseas, and they are being played regularly in Europe, therefore why can MultiChoice not do the same.
Mabaso explained that it is a long term strategy and that development for talent needs to be sustained, and that they also have to find out what the consumers are looking for. Therefore their southern-African audiences do not have to worry they are working on local content for them, but it is a process and it takes time. Besides the fact that MutiChoice does not cater for southern-African audiences the journalists were all in agreement that MultiChoice is better then their local broadcasters.
