THE change to digital television might he delayed well beyond the 2015 deadline set by the International Telecommunication Union.
This is according to projections by M-Net and e.tv that assume that Minister of Communications Siphiwe Nyanda will get his way and replace the DVB digital TV standard with the ISDB standard developed in Japan and upgraded in South America.

All countries are scheduled to have completed the “digital migration” process by 2015. a deadline set by the International Telecommunication Union.

Unused broadcasting frequencies are becoming increasingly hard to find.

The migration involves the phasing in of digital TV and the phasing out of analogue broadcasting.

Last week Nyanda announced that his department might review the government’s approval of the testing and implementation of the digital video broadcasting standard.

M-Net and e.tv joined forces yesterday In an attempt to publicly undermine the minister’s decision and outline the benefits and drawbacks of the two technologies.

M-Net chief executive Patricia Scholtemeyer said she did not understand the minister’s motivations for the about-turn because the digital video broadcasting trials had been “very successful”.

Marcel Golding. executive chairman of Hosken Consolidated Investments, which owns e.tv. was more critical: “The decision by the {department of communications] to open the debate is not only silly but undermines the co-ordinated and determined efforts by all parties including the SABC, to get our country ready for this migration.”

Source: The Times – Zweli Mokgata