Directive to reduce GTV channels unnecessary – Kweku Baako

The Editor-in-Chief of the New Crusading Guide newspaper Kweku Baako has called on the Government of Ghana to tread cautiously with regards to directive from the Ministry of Communications to the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation to reduce its channels from 6 to 3.

Describing the directive from the Ministry as needless, Mr Baako ordered government to stay away from all the narratives with respect to the brouhaha concerning the reduction of the state broadcasting television channels.

”Government should tread cautiously, I think both in terms of contents and assets. I don’t see government having grounds on this matter. Let’s trigger the National Media Commission into all this. I think government should stay out of all this” he said on JoyNews’ Newsfile.

The Minister of Communications, Ursula Owusu on June 26 gave the state broadcaster a 60-day deadline to reduce its channels from six to three.

Mrs. Owusu-Ekuful defended the order to GBC noting that it had become unsustainable for the government to be covering the cost of GBC’s channels on the National Digital Terrestrial Television platform.

“If we are going to hand that cost completely to the broadcasting channels at this time when there is a general business slowdown… we will have a problem because, on the basis of the figures I have seen, you will be unable to pay for the cost of hosting the platform,” she explained.

Meanwhile Staff of the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) say they will challenge moves to reduce the state broadcaster’s channels.

Secretary of the GBC Union, Nutor Bibinii in an earlier interview told Citi News, staff of the GBC will continually protest the government’s decision, until the Minister of Communication rescinds the decision.

“We are humbly advising her[Minister of Communications]. She can take ten channels to herself but what belongs to the state, no political activist can come for it. If previous Ministers of Communication were taking one each, how many would have been left? We are saying no. It will not work and we shall challenge this decision at the peril of our lives.”