CAPE TOWN, June 9 (Xinhua) -- The opposition on Sunday urged police to provide protection to high-risk staff at the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) following an attempt to assassinate its internal audit executive.
This came after Thami Zikode, SABC internal audit executive, survived a shooting while in his car outside his home in Johannesburg on Friday evening. Four suspects fired at his vehicle after apparently following him home from the public broadcaster's Johannesburg office.
It remains clear that this is not an isolated incident but a coordinated effort by a corrupt network that had turned the SABC into their fiefdom and now face a real possibility of being exposed, the Democratic Alliance (DA) said.
Zikode reportedly was working on a forensic investigation into alleged corruption at the state-owned broadcaster when the assassination attempt took place.
Police on Sunday arrested a 37-year-old man in connection with the shooting and were still searching for three other suspects.
This is not the first time that SABC staff members have been threatened and intimidated.
Some SABC staff members have endured unrelenting threats to their emotional and physical well-being.
The SABC, haunted by a series of corruption scandals for long, has been operating under insolvent circumstances. Its Forensic Unit has issued 37 forensic reports on allegations ranging from fraud and corruption, to bribery and nepotism at the public broadcaster since May 2014.
However, many of these findings still await corrective action from the SABC management.
