During the service of his articles, Mr Mahapa covered a number of areas ranging from Commercial and Corporate Law, Labour Law, Media and Communications, Litigation, Constitutional Law, Regulatory Compliance, Family law and Procurement Law amongst others. Some of the key matters worked on in the period included representing the SABC in front of the Complaints and Compliance Committee of ICASA in respect of a contravention of the Broadcasting Act during the development of the SABC’s editorial policies. He also project-managed the organizational re-alignment of a Sector Education and Training Authority then placed under Administration and served numerous clients in various areas of the law spanning Corporate Governance, Joint-venture establishments, BB-BEE optimizations, Regulatory Compliance with Type Approval frameworks, application for the provision of a channel to Multichoice, consumer protection, to name a few.

Mr Mahapa was responsible for the development of the revised and updated internal Compliance Manual of the SABC tracking the SABC’s various regulatory obligations across the different services. This included the development of a compliance tracker to assist the SABC to proactively monitor its obligations and to ensure the timely development of the different compliance reports and sufficient time for the review thereof at the different approval levels.

Following his departure from ICASA, He then went on to serve in the legal and regulatory department of the then newly licence subscription broadcaster, TopTV. In that time, he led the company’s efforts to acquire authorization to introduce an adult bouquet to its existing channels, a first for the South African market, guiding the company through the collation of research, packaging of the bouquet and technology architecture aimed at ensuring compliance with the existing regulatory framework. This project also included a successful bout of litigation against the regulatory authority at the High Court (Johannesburg) and a reconsideration of the application, leading to the successful authorization of the Channel.

In addition to administering all regulatory obligations of the company, he served on the industry self-regulatory body, the National Association of Broadcasters (the NAB), ultimately joining its executive committee. In this role, Mr Mahapa was involved in broader industry wide policy issues including lobbying for government support for industry preferred positions. Parallel to these roles, he was appointed by the President of the Republic to become a board member of the Media Development and Diversity Agency (the MDDA), a government//operator funded agency to develop community and small commercial media across the republic, amongst other things, from 2011 to 2014. Unfortunately, his tenure with TopTV ended with the imminent business rescue application of the company and the coincidental offer of an opportunity in the telecommunications space.

This is where Mr Mahapa started his professional career with a four year stint at the national regulator, ICASA (Independent Communications Authority of South Africa) wherein he served in several roles spanning licensing and compliance of both broadcasting and electronic communications services. During his tenure at ICASA, Mr Mahapa served on various Council committees including the licensing of Subscription Broadcasting services, the implementation of the new licensing framework through the issuing of technology neutral converged licences, the development and prescription of Annual Licence Fees Regulations, the development and prescription of the Digital Migration regulations, the licensing of community radio services, the review of the Universal Service and Access obligations framework in addition to serving in other administrative capacities including bid evaluation and supplier management, drafting of regulations, publication of government gazettes and management of projects to name a few.