GELFAND Kausiyo, who was last week appointed to the new ZBC board, never plagiarised SABC work and resigned from the South African broadcaster on his own accord, NewsDay has learnt.
Staff Reporter
Kausiyo told NewsDay the allegations against him were a smear campaign by people who were bent on tarnishing his image and, as a foreigner, stop him from becoming SABC chief technology officer (CTO).
Yesterday NewsDay carried an article based on allegations made in 2011 that Kausiyo had plagiarised a document and therefore was not fit to be on the new ZBC board of directors. The said document was then used by radio-broadcasting aspirant KissFM to apply for a radio licence.
It has emerged this was not the case.
“I never plagiarised any document. I also wondered where the allegations came from. For the record, I happened to be among the audience when the KissFM proposal was presented. I had keen interest as a Zimbabwean who had seen an opportunity to come back home. If I had plagiarised the document, how come KissFM came third? How could BAZ (Broadcasting Authority of Zimbabwe) have considered its proposal in the first place?” Kausiyo said.
“SABC does not hold intellectual property rights to any of its designs – it does not design anything, everything is done by external engineers. The KissFM proposal was not even done by me, but by Hitech Audio and the designer is Kevin Manas.”
Kausiyo added: “The reason for all the political machinations was that I was being touted as the next SABC CTO having risen through the ranks as a foreigner to becoming a senior media manager. I then decided to resign on my own on August 6, 2012, nine months after the SABC tried to smear my name, but failed to stick anything on me.”
