Now SABC Wants TV License Fees if You Watch Netflix on a Laptop

The constantly cash-strapped and facing bankruptcy South African Broadcasting Corporation now wants people to pay TV license fees not only if you don’t watch their television programmes but also even if you watch streaming services like Netflix on your laptop.

In a presentation to the parliamentary portfolio committee for communications, the deputy minister of communications Pinky Kekana reportedly gave a presentation in which it was recommended that regulation was needed on pay-service providers like MultiChoice and subscription video on demand services like Netflix. She said, inexplicably, this would be like municipalities collecting traffic fines.

According to a slide presentation, she said the definition of a TV licence in South Africa was “outdated.”

“But we are not only limiting it to TV,” Kekana was quoted saying in MyBroadband. “We also have other platforms where people consume content and in all of those areas, that is where we should look at how we are able to get SABC licence fees from those gadgets.”