Watch: Television in South Africa turns 40
Many imported programmes were dubbed into Afrikaans
SABC TV marks its 40th anniversary today (January 5).
The very first nationwide broadcast took place on Monday, January 5, 1976 when Dorianne Berry and Heinrich Marnitz welcomed viewers to the “opening night” of TV in the country.
Haas Das se Nuuskas was the first programme ever screened on South African TV, and soon became its most popular show among both children and adults, to whom its social and political satire appealed.
The news-reading rabbit voiced by SABC legend Riaan Cruywagen also set a precedent for the wide use of puppets in SA children’s shows.
The South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) started regular daily television transmissions on a single channel after seven months of trial transmissions during 1975. The service was officially opened by Prime Minister Ben Vorster, who warned against slanted news and unbalanced presentations.
Many imported programmes were dubbed into Afrikaans, the first being the British series The Sweeney, known in Afrikaans as Blitspatrollie.
However, in order to accommodate English speakers, the SABC began to simulcast the original soundtrack of American series such as Miami Vice and Beverly Hills 90210 on an FM radio service called Radio 2000.
A year later more than 1.5 million viewers were tuning in every evening (the service was initially broadcast only 37 hours per week), according to South African historian Carin Bevan.
Many of these SABC shows held crossover appeal for children and adults. A number of these homegrown hits, such as Wielie Wielie Walie, Haas Das se Nuuskas, Pumpkin Patch, Kideo, Mina Moo and Professor Fossi en die Dinosaurusse were created by prolific writer Louise Smit.
This milestone is highly significant as the South Africa’s television industry is hovering on the verge of the biggest sea change since the introduction of television.
In 2016 the long-delayed commercial switch from analogue to digital terrestrial television (DTT) broadcasting will simply have to start in South Africa after the country missed the internationally agreed to deadline for the switch-off of analogue TV signals by June 2015.
