Sakarian Broadcasting Service

The Sakarian Broadcasting Service (SBS) is one of Sakaria's public broadcasters, the other ones being Retese and CBN. Just like other Sakarian public broadcasters, SBS is funded by the Sakarian government and license fees, but is managed independently.

The SBS now provides radio, television, online, and mobile services throughout metropolitan and regional Sakaria and overseas through SBS Connect. The SBS's headquarters are in the SBS Communications Office, Yeretski.

Its formal goals include promoting the expansion of knowledge, Sakaria culture, entertainment and innovation in broadcasting.

As of 2021, SBS's combined channels are the fifth largest free-to-air channel in the country, behind TV5, TVO, CBN and PBN.

Closure of NBN
The National Broadcasting Network (NBN) had deteriorated in status and function. Public committees found that the deterioration stemmed from a number of factors, including its large number of employees, high salary costs, rigid wage agreements, mismanagement by the Government and abuse of the broadcaster by its government.

Since its foundation in 1961, it had went under nearly 14 restructurings, 10 of them had included rebranding and moving of head offices. The restructurings were mainly caused by abuse of the State Committee on Television and Radio Broadcasting, the company which is meant to govern the public broadcasters.

According to investigations by outside committees, the SCTRB had abused its power multiple times to force the NBN to portray the Government in good light. However, the editorial department of NBN refused to do so, as per the Sakarian Broadcaster Act of 1989, which requires the NBN to:"...gather and present news and information with independence and present a diversity of perspectives so that, over time, no significant strand of thought or belief within the community is knowingly excluded or disproportionately represented. The broadcaster is expected to take no editorial stance other than a commitment to fundamental democratic principles. The broadcaster should also not be persuaded by any form of government entity, and present its broadcasting freely."This was made worse in 2016, when the Christina government was put into power. Christina had allegedly tried to disband the Sakarian Broadcaster Act, which she denied.

Since 2016, there have been numerous labor strikes from the SBS due to what most employees felt 'an interference from the government to be biased'.

The most major one was in 2017, a NBN union decided to hold a strike, which began on 8 September and lasted until January 3, 2018, due to the SCTRB allegedly influencing news coverage to be in favor of Christinas administration. As a result of the boycott, there has been a severe reduction in the airing of NBN news programs, culture programs, radio shows, and variety shows due to most staff members taking part in the strike. Ratings also plunged, from a 31.3% average to 19.6%.

In response, SCTRB had made a statement saying that they will no longer interfere with NBN's editorial department. 2 days later of the statement, the union strike ended and employees went back into working.

However, critics say that the SCTRB did not fully say the truth with their statement.

This was made even clearer when the flagship news program of the NBN, the 'National Journal' suddenly leaned towards the National Party and its far-right beliefs. This was shocking for many as the National Journal was praised for its editorial independence in the years prior multiple times.

In 2018, it was revealed that there was heavy internal disputes in the NBN.

Then in mid-2019, most of the officials in the higher rank such as chair, executive, etc. had left the SBS. In response, nearly 62% of NBN's employees had also resigned. This caused a chaos within the broadcaster, and SCTRB struggled to keep up.

In April 2020, SCTRB revealed that they could no longer fund the NBN and that they would be liquidating its assets. The NBN had officially went defunct, after nearly 59 years of broadcasting.

In June 2, 2020, the Head Minister for Media and Communications announced that they will set up a new public broadcaster later that month.

Forming SBS
To formulate the necessary legislation, the National Assembly set up a committee (headed by Kazhik Nadrar) to discuss the public-broadcasting bill. The committee began its deliberations on June 5, 2020, and quickly conducted a number of meetings to allow the completion of the legislative process by the end of the National Assembly session in June. On June 9, a bill was approved and passed to the National Assembly for a second and third reading. The Public Broadcasting Law, which ordered the establishment of the Sakarian Broadcasting Service and the full closure of the NBN on June 15, 2020. According to the new law, 65% of the employees of the new body would come from the NBN.

Section 7 of the law describes the corporation's activity:


 * (A) The Sakarian Broadcasting Service will broadcast and provide various types of content visually, audio and written, on TV, on radio and on the Internet.
 * (B) The content provided by the Sakarian Broadcasting Service shall be independent and directed to all citizens and residents of the Republic of Sakaria, shall reflect and document Sakaria as a diverse and democratic state, its values and the heritage of Sakaria and give fair, equal and balanced expression to the diversity of views and opinions prevalent in the Israeli public.
 * (C) The Sakarian Broadcasting Service shall provide news content and content in day-to-day matters in a professional, fair, responsible, independent, critical, impartial and reliable manner, with transparency and with the exercise of journalistic judgment and loyalty to the truth and the obligation to report to the public.
 * (D) Sakarian Broadcasting Service will provide diverse content for children and youth, and will promote the creation of educational content for children and youth.
 * (E) The Sakarian Broadcasting Service will not be interfered by any government entity, and will present its programming in a fair and independent manner.

Start of operations
The SBS began operations on June 20, 2020. Kitkao Zhiao ( former chairman of TV5 in 2002 ) was appointed head of the broadcaster in June 27, 2020. The chairman of the board of directors is Welao Alan. On June 7, 2020, Aqoweral Zenruela ( former journalist for TVO) was appointed director of the news department.

The corporation's construction budget was ₱350 million, ₱120 million for professional equipment, ₱28 million for labor, ₱14 million for operations, ₱128 million for real estate and ₱60 million for content acquisition.

Channels / Services
Terrestrial

SBS TV - SBS' flagship channel, it broadcasts news and current affairs, education, drama, sports, children's programming and culture.

SBS Now - Broadcasts cultural, educational and informational programming. Similar to SBS TV, its main difference is that SBS Now only focuses on local news.

SBS Plus - SBS' entertainment and drama channel, its programming is composed mainly of talk shows, reality shows, foreign and local TV dramas, game shows, comedy and lifestyle.

Cable
SBS 7 - Lifestyle channel, also airs foreign series and old Sakarian TV series.

International
SBS Connect - Broadcast on a 24-hour schedule with programs including news, dramas and entertainment.

Radio
As of June 2021, there is no radio service that's in operation. SBS has stated that it will however launch a radio service by the end of 2021.

Mobile and Internet
sbs.media.rk - The main website for SBS, features guides, news, schedules and more

SBS Pulse - Video-on-demand Service.

Programmes
List of programmes broadcast by Sakarian Broadcasting Service

SBS' well-balanced program lineup consists of news and public service programs, entertainment and informative programs, talk shows, sports shows, documentaries and educational programs

Funding
The SBS is primarily funded by the Sakarian public, in addition to some revenue received from commercial offerings and its retail outlets. A small amount is also funded by the Government through the Ministry for Media and Communications.

Headquarters
After the dissolution of the NBN, the committee which was tasked in forming a new broadcaster decided to retain the former headquarters of NBN and move SBS into it.

The NBN Television Studios was renamed into SBS Communications Office the day after the start of operations of SBS.

The SBS Communications Office houses studios for news programming and drama production, it also houses the offices for employees and high rank officials.

In January 2021, the SBS decided that they plan to move its headquarters to a new building, presumably to be constructed. Then in March 2021, SBS had announced that they will construct a new building in Neraetski to house its headquarters. The new building, named the SBS Global Media City began construction on May 6, 2021. It is set for completion in December of the same year.