Moxii Africa (formerly Media Monitoring Africa)  and the SOS Support Public Broadcasting Coalition (SOS) are stunned that the 2026 national budget allocates zero funding for the SABC to cover this year’s Local Government Elections.

The 2026 ENE, Vote 30, (the detailed budget chapter for a specific department) shows a dedicated R35 million was allocated for the 2024 elections, but no equivalent allocation exists for 2026.

“This is a reckless failure, the SABC’s core mandate is to cover critical issues and is legally obligated to cover elections — but Treasury is giving it nothing to do the job.” says Moxii Africa Executive Director William Bird.

Despite the SABC receiving limited public‑mandate funding for general operations (14,4 million for programme production, and 153 796 million for the public broadcasting mandate) none of this is ring‑fenced for elections. Covering elections, and local government elections specifically, requires additional dedicated resources to ensure nationwide reporting teams, logistics, multilingual coverage, and critically, voter education.

“Without a properly funded public broadcaster during the election period, that is well equipped to represent diverse political opinions and capture political activities while holding government accountable, our democracy is weakened long before voters even reach the ballot box.” says SOS Coalition National Coordinator Uyanda Siyotula.

It would appear additional budget allocations have been utilised to cover the debt for signal distribution that is owed to Sentech.  (Sentech will get 700 million for operations and an additional 189 million for dual illumination.) While this might help alleviate Sentech’s immediate financial woes, it is very much akin to robbing Peter to pay Paul.  It may assist Sentech in the short term but it doesn’t solve SABC’s financial crisis, and it exposes the country’s local government elections to a huge risk.

“Expecting the SABC to fulfil its legally binding public‑mandate obligations during the 2026 local elections without any dedicated budget is not only irresponsible – it undermines our democracy. The SABC cannot be expected to cover thousands of wards, hundreds of municipalities, and every major party and community without the necessary resources.” added Bird

Why it matters – The SABC is being set up to fail

Local elections determine service delivery, accountability and community power. Millions rely on the SABC — especially in rural areas — for trustworthy, credible information. Moxxi Africa’s research over the years has highlighted the critical role the SABC plays in ensuring South Africa has free fair and credible elections.

The organisations stress that free and fair elections are impossible without independent, accessible, credible, accurate and fair, nationwide media coverage.

The SABC reaches more South Africans than any other broadcaster, especially in rural and underserved areas. Cutting election funding risks:

• reduced coverage in communities most dependent on the SABC
• imbalanced or incomplete reporting
• weakened oversight of political parties and candidates
• less scrutiny of local issues and governance failures
• misinformation and disinformation filling the vacuum

“ With the Government of National Unity (GNU) in power, these local government elections will be highly contented, making the role of the SABC more critical for scrutiny and  government accountability; for the benefit of the millions of South Africans whose primary source of information is the public broadcaster.” added Siyotula.

Local government elections often have the lowest voter turnout and the highest risk of political conflict— making thorough, well‑resourced reporting more important than ever.

“You cannot run free and fair elections while defunding the public broadcaster,” Bird adds.

What makes the failure all the more concerning is that the issue was raised and highlighted during Parliament Portfolio Committee on Communications last week  as reported by TechCentral.  During the hearings the alarm bells were rung by the SABC. Various members of the Committee, including the Chair, and The Minister also expressed the request for resources.

Moxii Africa and the SOS Coalition demand immediate action

We call on Treasury and the Department of Communications to:

1. Urgently allocate appropriate funding  to the SABC to ensure it can adequately cover the 2026 local government elections.
2. Urgently address the issue of an SABC Bill including fixing the the SABC’s funding model,
3. Protect SABC independence during the election period

Democracy is not optional — and neither is properly funding the SABC.

For more please contact :

Moxii Africa                                         SOS Coalition

William Bird 082 887 1370                 Uyanda Siyotula 060 691 2462

Thandi Smith 073 470 7306                Carol Seatlanyane 067 011 5648

About Moxii Africa

Moxii Africa’s vision is to strive for open and trusted information and to build an accessible, accountable, and transparent information ecosystem we can trust. We aim to ensure accountability, open information, promote safety, empower the public, and instill information integrity in South Africa and the rest of the continent.

Follow Moxii on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube

About SOS

SOS: Support Public Broadcasting Coalition (SOS) is a non-profit, civil society coalition that was established in 2008. We advocate for robust public service media (PSM) in South Africa and tirelessly campaign for universal access to quality public interest content. Essentially, our vision comprises a healthy and sustainable information ecosystem that is based on free universal access to quality publ

‍