The bizarre thing about the process to select councillors for the Independent Communications Authority of SA (Icasa) is that, by and large, the best of the bunch were chosen, despite the controversy, confusion and convolution. One can only hope this will go some way to solve the problems that beset the regulator, or even just make it marginally effective.

Sitting in on the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Communications, the legislative's oversight body for Icasa, was fun for this reporter. I laughed, I cried, I sunk into levels of deep depression and then rebounded to euphoric highs as some questions were actually answered coherently.

This emotional roller-coaster was brought on by the fact that so few of the nominees actually researched what it meant to be an Icasa councillor prior to applying for the position. Add to that the overall poor quality of the CVs submitted, by supposedly very well-educated people, the poor answers to admittedly equally poor questions put to them by the politicians, and the fact that almost none understood what a public process entailed and you may get the idea.