The Lottery has stopped a grant to your lavishly funded once-a-year SATMA awards. Illustration: Lisa Nelson (SATMA brand superimposed over original illustration)

From 2019 to 2022 the South African Conventional New music Awards gained above R16-million in the Lottery.
But the Lottery has withheld payment with the 2023 grant subsequent an investigation.
The NLC has requested the Special Investigating Unit to probe alleged “double dipping” in decades exactly where funders besides the NLC also chipped in to help fund the awards.
The scale of funding to the yearly two evening celebration is astonishing.
The Mpumalanga government has funded the awards with more than R41-million right after it “was awarded the best” to host the SATMA awards for three many years, beginning in the 2020/21 financial calendar year.
This has actually been In combination with Lottery funding.
The Nationwide Lotteries Fee (NLC) is refusing to pay a R1.two-million grant it originally authorized for an once-a-year standard new music awards ceremony. Precisely the same event also acquired tens of millions of rand through the Mpumalanga provincial government.

From 2019 to 2022 the NLC awarded numerous grants totalling Just about R16.four-million to the Mageza Heritage Foundation, the organisers from the annual South African Standard Audio Awards (SATMA).

But it surely halted the payment of the 2023 grant soon after an inside investigation.

GroundUp has exposed enormous corruption inside the NLC that happened till the previous board and administration was replaced in 2022. The brand new NLC leadership is seeking to clear up the corruption of the previous.

The NLC’s investigation focused on both equally the 2023 funding and earlier grants awarded to Mageza to stage the awards. The investigation also probed a payment of around R718,000, allegedly paid from Lottery cash to G4 Brothers, of which Dumisani Gobe, the founding father of the SATMA awards, is actually a director.

Questioned if Mageza compensated G4 a licencing or every other costs to phase the awards, Goba reported: “G4 was commissioned to complete a production of the function and obtained paid out for the people products and services, like to deal with and produce the main party, roadshows, etcetera. I'm the founder of the SATMA Awards; I'm the a person who need to be compensated for generating the notion based on affordability and what Mageza decides.”

The NLC has handed a file of its investigation for the Special Investigating Unit (SIU). It's got asked the SIU to research 4 various lottery-funded jobs that obtained grants involving Oct 2020 and May 2023, and also the payment to G4 Brothers.

The NLC has also asked the SIU to probe alleged “double dipping” in a long time wherever funders in addition to the NLC also chipped in to help fund the awards.

This includes a grant of R400,000 in the National Heritage Council and just more than R62,000 from “SABC Mobile” in 2020 - exactly the same monetary year wherein the party gained Virtually R2.6-million in lottery funding and R13.five-million from your Mpumalanga Office of Lifestyle, Sports and Recreation (MDCSR).

MDCSR funded the awards into the tune of in excess of R41-million following it “was awarded the ideal” to host the SATMA awards for three several years, commencing inside the 2020/21 money calendar year.

The Mpumalanga authorities’s funding for SATMA about that interval was significantly greater than grants to every other organisation for cultural assignments and gatherings.

The MDSCR gave R3.five-million to SATMA while in the 2019/twenty fiscal yr just before ramping up its contribution right after signing the agreement to host the awards over another 3 many years.

The total spending plan submitted on the NLC when Mageza applied for that disputed 2023 SATMA funding was R1.2-million. But of the, only R500,000 was allotted for the actual staging of your occasion. Other line merchandise inside the spending plan incorporated R400,000 for “staff salaries and benefits”, R200,000 for “stipends” and R100,000 for “travel.”

The awards have been held on fifteen December within the Durban International หุ้น ชอง 9 Conference Centre. Mageza says it urgently desires the blocked grant to pay the function’s company companies.

The SATMA awards, which ended up first held in 2006, are staged above two evenings and it is actually unclear how the tens of millions in grants from your NLC, MDCSR together with other funders were being used.

Desmond Msomi, the chairman of Mageza, didn't reply to distinct issues from GroundUp, such as the cost of staging a SATMA awards ceremony.

Rather, he stated: “Your questions are pointed out. On the other hand, we are already suggested by the NLC that this matter is staying investigated through the SIU. Hence, we are not able to reply to your queries right until we are suggested the investigation has been finished and the amount owed has become compensated to Mageza.”

Just after Mpumalanga “received the right” to host the awards for three many years, the then provincial Culture, Activity and Recreation MEC, Lindiwe Ntshalintshali, explained it as “a boon” to the province.

“Internet hosting the SATMA Awards has optimistic economic spinoffs with the Mpumalanga coffers and In addition it talks into the Section’s mandate of marketing social cohesion.”