Election debate 2014 at Pella, Northern Cape - report from the technical producer

By Rena Maghundu
RBF Technical Producer

Pella is a pristine town in the Northern Cape. The X-K FM current affairs team and RBF recorded an outside broadcast (OB) of a pre-election debate with the community of Pella to make their voices heard.

The team were surprised by the beauty of the nature as they turned into the gravel road leading to the town. Pella is situated 30 kilometres outside of Poffader. From Kimberley they had to drive for a day to get to Pella, passing through Upington as well.

"Pella is an oasis in Namakwa (Bushmanland) in the Northern Cape province of South Africa earlier known as Cammas Fonteyn, the spring was used by a nearby stronghold of the San people. In 1776 a South African Dutch farmer called Coenraad Feijt settled there and lived in harmony with the San despite their fondness for raiding the cattle of the Dutch farmers in the Hantam. A nearby farm called Aggeneys later became the site of the modern mining town of that name." - Wkipedia

The Cathedral in Pella

Pella

The team went in search of a river in the area as as the area is very dry, but could only found the place where the river dried up.

A drive in the surrounding area of Pella

They were amazed to see the high mountains with small trees. The beauty of the area made an impact on them.

The Team

Left Ulrich Hendriks; middle Rena Maghundu and right Tressel Katembo

Back Magdalena Juharra 

Picture by Fresto Mangumbu

The team for the outside broadcast consisted of five people, four from news and one from RBF.


Pella Pre-election Debate

Community Hall in Pella

The big day of the broadcast arrived, with political parties in attendance to face the community of Pella. The beautiful decorated hall added to the rural charm of the environment, as well as gave the team motivation to do their job.
Tressel Katembo and Fresto Mangumbu handled the proceedings in the hall.

Magdalena Juharra was the producer of the day, ensuring the success of the broadcast. Rena Maghundu, the only technical producer in the team, took the pictures.

Magdalena Juharra and Rena Maghundu during the broadcast (on far right)

Ulrich Hendriks handled the floor microphone and made sure they heard what the political parties were saying. He gets a special mention because it is very difficult to handle the floor microphone when the people got angry when their hands were raised for too long.

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Rena Maghundu thanks RBF and News Management for giving her the opportunity to attend the OB and to visit Pella. She also thanks her team members for their support during this time.


Blog post and pictures by Rena Maghundu.

The Kalahari Desert Festival 21 - 23 March 2014 > "Sound Hunting" for archival purposes

SOUND HUNTING 
by Moshe Maghundu
Archivist: SABC Platfontein 

The Kalahari Desert Festival took place for a second time in the Kalahari at Andriesvale, ten kilometres from Ashkam. This event is very historical in nature to the SAN people as it brings together all San people from different countries with their traditional festivities.

The San people from Platfontein, the Kalahari, Upington and others from the Western Cape took part as the festivities started on the evening of Friday, 21 March, on Human Rights Day.

Moshe Maghundu was there with a crew to do “sound hunting”. He was able to host storytelling sessions with the Kalahari people and others. The people gave their full cooperation. He faced challenges with some people expecting to be reimbursed for their oral contributions. He complied out of his own pocket because of his love for the project. He understands and put a great value on their contributions for heritage and archival purposes.

Station X-K FM covered the event live from its opening till the evening of the last day Saturday 22 March.They were also responsible for arranging some of the interviews which Moshe recorded.

• Mr Markus Jetembo        Presenter
• Mr Joe Mpungo               Presenter
• Mr Piorro Mushavanga   Producer
• Me Rena Maghundu       Technical Producer
• Mr Moshe Maghundu     Archivist

X-K FM

X-K FM struggled with some technical difficulties, but luckily the technical producer took care of the problems.

It is highly appreciated that Mike Nemane provided the gazebo in which the broadcast took place.

The challenges of the Kalahari sand did not put a damper on the uplifting spirit of the festival.
Moshe Maghundu was working non-stop to get the people to tell their stories. Although it was hot, time was limited for him to get all the interviews.

Moshe Maghundu during a short break
before taking up the Marantz recorder again

DRAPJJ STARS

There were music performances in the main tent. The group from Platfontein, called the DRAPJJ STARS, with hip hop and rap music, mixed it up with the San language and the English language.

DRAPJJ STARS

The moment DRAPJJ STARS stepped  on the stage, every one in the surrounding areas ran to the tent to watch their performance.

X-K FM presenter interviewing young people

On the evening of the last day the presenter interviewed  young people about their  experiences at the Kalahari Desert Festival 2014. The presenters did an excellent job.

The donkey carts were the only transport allowed at the venue. People had to pay to be transported around in the area and it was found to be very trustworthy.

Hennie Swart

Special thanks goes to the main man, a friend, organiser and everything of the Kalahari Desert Festival.
He started the initiative for the San people to share their cultural heritage. His name is Hennie Swart, the only white man with a black surname. He drives a black Isuzu truck and likes wearing his black t-shirt.

Also thanks to the following people for making the trip a success:

• Me Regina Beregho, X-K FM station manager.
• Mr William Heath, Line Manager RBF.

The SABC Information Library - Did you know?

"The SABC celebrates South African Library Week
from 15-22 March 2014"

During the most recent South African Library Week 2014, the SABC Information Library had an internal awareness campaign running in the SABC about the services that they provide to their corporate clients.

"The information library started using a manual way of cataloguing 

which ended in 1979 and it was called a card system."

"During 1988 the library was computerized and started ordering and 

circulating periodicals on behalf of all SABC staff."

"Dr. Burgers together with Ms Rhoda made a small collection of fiction books 

and organized them to assist radio announcers. 

The collection grew to 10,000 in 1979"

Some more facts about the SABC Information Library:

Did you know? 

• The information library was established in 1961 and it is situated at Radio Park K2 A1-19.

• The vision of the library is to be the leading provider for the public broadcaster and it’s stakeholders ad it’s mission is to acquire and make available, at all times, information required by the library’s users-both internal and external and again to provide relevant information upon request.

• The information library has three sections that comprises of book section, magazine and newspaper section.

• That the SABC has a fully-fledged and well equipped Information Library with about 30012 Books that can be borrowed and used by staff for free.

• The book section’s collection comprises of books of different subjects not only limited to broadcasting also include academics.

• That Thelma Hlapolosa, Abel Thulare and Themba Mtshali are responsible for the newspaper cutting section in the library. This section has a huge collection of newspaper clippings like Mandela collection, TRC, biographies and etc.

• The magazine section is managed by Nomawethu Mgangxela and consists of more than 35 titles. We have weekly, monthly, quarterly and annual magazines and more than 39081 indexed articles on our system which is good for research. Biographies, finances, personalities, politics and many more form part of the indexed articles.

• That SABC information library has subscriptions to the online databases that you can search information for work and personal use. You can search African Electronic Journals (SA ePublications), access to SA ePublications, and Law collection via the Sabinet Reference platform.  www.sabinet.co.za

• A hard copy version of newspapers online is available at 
  http//library.pressdisplay.com/

Information supplied by the SABC Information Library.