SABC fined R10,000 for ‘random’ number in soapie — that wasn’t random
The South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) has been fined R10,000 for a bungle that sent hundreds‚ if not thousands‚ of infuriating telephone calls to an unsuspecting woman in Johannesburg. Thapelo Diale’s world was turned upside down when her cellphone started ringing non-stop and she was subjected to a torrent of verbal abuse from TV soap opera fans. The origin of her woes was traced back to the filming of an episode of Isigingo last year when Shona Ferguson‚ who plays the character Tyson Mokoena‚ was asked by a director to come up with a cellphone number for another character. There was no number in the script‚ so a random number was chosen — and read out during the episode that aired in November 2016. However, that random number belonged to Diale who works for a railway consortium. The consequences were "unprecedented‚ extraordinary and serious" according to the Broadcasting Complaints Commission of South Africa (BCCSA). Diale’s cellphone rang so much that it caused serio...
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