Implementation of change management with reference to Afrikaans at MNet and SABC

Abstract

The study deals with the extent to which change should be implemented by institutions. It is of paramount importance that staff be at the centre of the change throughout the entire process. It is worth noting that in the absence of this serious phenomenon, there seems to be little hope of raising employee confidence, as is notable from the responses of the employees of MNet and SABC. The sociopolitical history of South Africa has played a major role in language used in the country's media: television, newspapers and radio. English is by far the most widely used language in the media, followed by Afrikaans and the African languages in that order. Except for multilingual programmes, it was relatively easy to determine the amount of airtime allocated to each individual language. A previous study shows that the distribution of airtime on South African television is strikingly uneven, with English taking up 91,95% of the total weekly airtime, Afrikaans 5,66% and all nine African languages sharing a mere 2.39% of airtime collectively. The study further deals with the origin and development of the Afrikaans language in South Africa. For many years Afrikaans took centre stage in South Africa. Especially during the apartheid years the use and power of Afrikaans increased dramatically on the SABC. Since 1994 English has gained more territorial political clout than Afrikaans in virtually all the country's institutions, including the media. The SABC took a political decision to cut vigorously on Afrikaans programming. That triggered MNet's decision to embark on a business decision to establish a dedicated Afrikaans channel. This study shows that employees at the SABC are generally unsatisfied with the broadcaster's decision and staff at MNet are in agreement with the fact that Afrikaans has lost most of its privileges and political prestige it had during the apartheid era, it could still present a challenge to the hegemony of English in all the higher domains, except diplomacy.