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Who is Dr Iqbal Survé – future owner of Independent Newspapers?

by Gill Moodie (@GrubstreetSA) Who is Dr Iqbal Survé, the man who is about to become South Africa’s newest media proprietor if the sale of Independent Newspapers goes through?

Yesterday it was announced that the Irish owners of Independent Newspapers had agreed to sell their South African division to Sekunjalo Independent Media Consortium led by Survé for R2-billion.

The deal, said a story in Business Report, is still subject to the final agreement being signed by both parties, shareholder approval by the Irish owners and approval by the Competition Commission.

Independent Newspaper is the biggest collection of English newspaper in the country and includes The Star, Cape Times, Cape Argus, The Mercury, Daily News, Pretoria News as well as publishing phenomenon, the isiZulu Isolezwe.

This is not Survé’s only venture into media ownership and Grubstreet revealed last week that his company, Sekunjalo, was backing a new medium-wave radio station for Cape Town, Magic AM.

Moegsien Williams Q&A: The New Age business model, the business breakfasts and Helen Zille

by Gill Moodie (@GrubstreetSA) Is The New Age the Great Evil or just another newspaper trying to get off the ground?

Ever since it launched two years ago, controversy has swirled around the paper because its main shareholders – the Gupta family – are close associates with the family of our controversial president, Jacob Zuma.

The paper has always said its intention is to tell the good-news stories of South Africa and give the government credit where it’s due but not to be the mouthpiece of the ruling party.

But its detractors – especially since the latest controversy around parastatal funding for its SABC business breakfasts – say the paper is nothing more than another Citizen of the infamous Info scandal of the 1970s.

Grubstreet interviewed The New Age’s editor, Moegsien Williams, last week to find out more about how The New Age operates, its emerging business model and what kind of paper he wants it to be.

ABC Analysis Q2 2012: Daily newspapers — Isolezwe breathing down The Star’s neck

The ABC has released circulation statistics for the period April 2012 to June 2012. Total daily newspaper sales in South Africa fell from the 1,386,504 in Q2 2011 to 1,373,377 in Q2 2012.

The ‘mega R25,000,000 MILLION’ auction from Aucor

I have never met Rick Raubenheimer but I can yell you the guys has a sense of humour. He recently lodged a complaint with the Advertising Standards Authority of SA (ASA) against a print advertisement for auction house Aucor.