Communications Minister, Khumbudzo Ntshavheni, has called on members of the public to apply for upgrading their television network from analogue to digital before the end of September cut-off deadline for new applications.
She was speaking in Lwandle in Strand outside Cape Town during an awareness campaign about the importance of digital migration.
Ntshavheni says there will be benefits for going digital in the next three years, especially for poorer communities.
“Previously, we had said we will switch off by 30th of June but we will let registrations to continue to say anybody can still apply and we will connect them. The difference now (is that) we no longer say the registration will be open. If by 30 of September you do not apply we will connect those that have applied. We will switch off and I cannot determine a date now. But we will see the number applications that are coming through the we will make our projections.”
New application date extended to 30 September 2022: 7July 2022
Last week, it was reported that many communities in the rural Eastern Cape remained clueless about the migration processes, from analogue to digital.
Thousands of impoverished households still depend on analogue. Few households have been fitted with DTT decoders.
Some of the deserving people were just handed set top boxes that were never installed.
In the small village of KwaZulu-Natal in Ntabankulu, network connectivity is a major challenge. Half of the population are benefitting from digital terrestrial television, but very few households have successfully installed set top boxes.
