eMedia elevates MultiChoice rights complaint
October 19, 2023
By Chris Forrester
South African free-to-air broadcaster eMedia recently lost its court argument with pay-TV broadcaster MultiChoice over TV rights to the Rugby World Cup. eMedia’s legal application was struck out by the Johannesburg High Court.
Lawyers for eMedia have now taken their complaint to the country’s Competition authorities.
eMedia says that it had filed papers with the Competition Commission and the Competition Tribunal over MultiChoice’s refusal to allow rugby and cricket games sublicensed to the SABC to be carried on the public broadcaster’s channels on the Openview free-to-air satellite platform.
“We have lodged a complaint with the Competition Commission and we have filed papers before the Competition Tribunal in respect of the provision in the sublicensing agreements concluded between MultiChoice and the SABC that prevent the SABC from utilising third-party platforms to transmit SABC channels that broadcast national sporting events,” eMedia said in its statement..
“MultiChoice’s conduct in this regard is particularly shocking because it has sublicensed these rights to the SABC, and accordingly, the SABC should not be prevented from utilising whichever platforms it selects to broadcast programming to the broader public,” eMedia added.
“We believe that it is in the national interest that these issues are dealt with as soon as possible and that there are no undue delays in the merits of these matters being ventilated fully. National sporting events are part of our nation building process, and accordingly, MultiChoice’s tactics and behaviour which are simply designed to entrench its dominant position in the television broadcasting sector in South Africa at the expense of the broader public in order to harm its competitors should not be countenanced,” eMedia continued.
MultiChoice responded, saying: “This is the third attempt by eMedia to launch urgent proceedings in the last two weeks – with the first two attempts being rightly rejected by the High Court. eMedia decided not to acquire the broadcasting rights in any form. It cannot now use the judicial system to ‘free-ride’ on the investments made by MultiChoice. MultiChoice considers the latest application to be entirely without merit and will oppose it vigorously.”