Use more local content, Minister urges TV stations
Dr Edward Kofi Omane-Boamah, Minister of Communication, has expressed Government’s commitment towards ensuring that television stations in the country dedicate 60 percent of their content to local issues.
This, he said, would enable the country preserve its culture from being adulterated by the influx of foreign programme as the adoption of Digital Terrestrial Transmission (DTT) by December 2014 would eventually lead to the proliferation of television stations in the country.
Dr Omane Boamah said this when he visited some television stations in the country to brief them on Government’s commitment towards hooking all television stations unto the DTT by December 2014.
Television stations visited by the Minister and members of the DTT Committee were First Digital TV (formally Sky TV), UTV, Crystal TV, GH One TV and TV Africa.
The use of DTT, which would eventually hook all television stations in the country onto one transmission machine and would be managed by Government, has a deadline of December 2014.
DTT would enable all stations operating in the country to have a nationwide coverage with clearer pictures and superior sound quality and less interference as compared to the current analog system being used.
The DTT system also offers far more channels, thus providing the viewer with a greater variety of programs to choose.
Although, the whole world is expected to be hooked unto the DTT by June 2015, Ghana had set the deadline of December 2014 so that the remaining six months would be used to address emerging challenges which might be experienced by television stations as they migrate onto the new system.
At all the stations visited, Dr Omane Boamah interacted with workers on the usefulness of the DTT system and urged them to improve on their content in order to remain relevant in the system as the DTT migration would make it easier for anyone who wanted to establish a television station.
He said viewers would now have access to a lot of channels and would only become glued to stations which were innovative and had good content.
Dr Omane Boamah urged stations in the country to stop investing in transmission machines and channel their money into the development of well equipped studios and good contents to remain competitive as the nation migrates unto DTT.
He said since one would not be required to purchase transmission machine before opening a TV station, people would abuse the system by establishing TV stations with poor content or programmes.
Dr Omane Boamah said although the DTT would be owned by Government, it would be managed by a management team which would be made up from both the membership of the Ghana Independent Broadcasters Association (GIBA) and Government.
This, he said, was to avoid the monopoly of the management of the DTT by one party which could lead to the provision of poor service to some media houses and cause them to become aggrieved.
Dr Omane Boamah urged management of the television stations visited to channel their grievances to GIBA for them to be address by the Ministry.
Chief Crystal Djirackor, Executive Director of Crystal TV and Chairman of GIBA, expressed his appreciation to Government for its readiness to listen to the concerns of GIBA and pledged the readiness of the Association members to support Government in its quest to adopt the DTT system.
Mr Iyiola Ayoade, Chief Executive Officer, for Charterhouse Ghana, who are the operators of GH One TV, appealed to Government to take a critical look at some of the investment already made by some television stations by importation of some transmitters.
He noted that a lot of television stations have already imported some transmitters because they wanted to expand their coverage to other parts of the country, adding that the decision by Government to hook them all unto one transmitter would mean great loss of investment as their machines might not be used.
Source: GNA