Florence Masebe and Kgomotso Christopher have once again cast the spotlight on the lack of proper legislature to protect artists in the entertainment industry and the ripple effect that has on their lives.
Florence and Kgomotso started a conversation on Twitter about actors not being paid what’s owed to them by the SABC.
The conversation started after Florence shared a tweet about how she knew TV legends who were owed “repeat fees” and that one of the actors had died without receiving the money.
She implored the new SABC CEO to fix the matter.
“It’s 2018 and actors still don’t have a clear and hassle free system to claim for the many times their work gets repeated. Fix this, new CEO,” she wrote.
It was then that Kgomotso spoke out about being owed money by the SABC for five years worth of “residual” payments on Isidingo.
Am still owed residual payments from working 5 years on Isidingo. Remember contractually, leads get percentage everytime show sold outside original territory & channel😉. Story is we need to create collection society to start processing the amounts from @SABC 😯 https://t.co/Y60AKGDj3o
— Kgomotso Christopher (@kgchristopher) June 27, 2018
Kgomotso explained that according to her contract, as a lead actor she was meant to receive a certain percentage every time the show she was on was aired outside its original country or channel.
The broadcaster always is responsible for residuals because broadcaster is the one that retains rights to distribute & make sales/ profit from the show. Well I keep my own contracts. Sabc, agents & production houses also keep them https://t.co/bYuSiErBSF
— Kgomotso Christopher (@kgchristopher) June 28, 2018
Speaking to TshisaLIVE, SABC spokesman Kaizer Kganyago explained that the public broadcaster was one of few that actually paid residual fees.
Kaizer explained that most broadcasters don’t have to pay anyone after they bought the rights to a production but SABC did so because they cared about the industry and the people in it.
“What I know is, in terms of contracts of people, this kind of thing is something that only the SABC has been paying for many years. When there are repeats, we pay a certain percentage to the people who are involved; like the individual, usually the leads and so on. So when we export the product, like for example when we sell an episode of Generations to another country or in another market, then we pay.”
Kaizer also admitted that because of all the technicalities and processes involved he was willing to go into too much detail. However, he added that was not aware of anyone being owed but if they were, they had to just follow the processes to claim what belongs to them.
“However, there are certain processes in place for that. You need to claim. If that has happenned and it involves you, then you need to claim. I am not aware that there are people who are owed but if there are, it’s a very simple matter, which doesn’t need a lot of… you just need to claim and also ensure that you qualify.”
Source: Soweatn
