South Africa’s ruling African National Congress (ANC) has kicked against the removal of Russia Today from the list of Multichoice channels available for viewership, describing it as an infringement on the people’s rights.

In a statement, the ANC said the decision to withdraw the TV station has negatively impacted “the freedom of choice to subscribers”.

On Saturday, Paul Mabe, ANC spokesperson, said the development limits subscribers’ consumption of news on the developments in the Russia-Ukraine war.

“The ANC believes that this censorship act done in bad faith during human rights month in South Africa undermines subscribers freedom of association and negatively impacts on the need for plurality of views and media freedom which is sacrosanct and provided for in our constitution,” Mr Mabe said.

MultiChoice Group confirmed on Wednesday that Russian state-owned news channel Russia Today (RT) has been “removed from [the] DStv platform until further notice”.

RT’s disappearance followed an announcement by MultiChoice which said it would not pull the channel from its pay-TV bouquets, despite bans and sanctions placed on it and Russian news broadcaster Sputnik by Google, YouTube, Microsoft, Meta and Twitter.