Jagdeo’s accusations answered

Jul 16, 2011 Letters

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Dear Editor,
The Advisory Committee on Broadcasting (ACB) was established on 15th November, 2001 as a semi-autonomous body, pursuant to regulations made under the Guyana Post and Telegraph Act, Chapter 47:01.
The law states that the ACB will comprise a chairman and two members, the chairman nominated by Guyana’s President, one member nominated by the leader of the Opposition, and the third by civil society. It does not say Private Sector Commission. I can’t say how they got involved in the act since they do not represent civil society.
Its tenure was supposed to extend until the establishment of an impartial Broadcasting Authority. The general understanding was that the Committee would advise on appropriate action in cases of violations of the conditions of the licence, which is the role usually performed by a Broadcasting Authority.
The formation of the ACB emerged out of an agreement reached between President Jagdeo and then Opposition Leader, Desmond Hoyte. The Memorandum of Understanding dated 15th November 2001, was intended to ensure that the then minister responsible for broadcasting, i.e. the Prime Minister, in the execution of his power pursuant to the Act and the Wireless Telegraphy Regulations made thereunder with respect to television station licences, will act in accordance with advice given to him by the ACB.
At the ceremony launching the ACB, Mr. Hoyte said that this was necessary since his party, the People’s National Congress Reform, was concerned with the fact that the Prime Minister was the sole arbitrator who made the decisions to oversee whether television stations were complying with the rules, and that there should be installed an independent body to advise him with the clear understanding that he would accept their advice”.
And Mr. Jagdeo said this “in every modern society, radio and television must operate within a regulatory framework in a neutral manner. This is exactly our [PPP] thinking on the matter too. We recognise that to administer any broadcast legislation, you will have to have an independent committee that would be seen as clear and impartial for it to have any credibility so that when they make decisions (these) will be widely accepted by the public”.
In other words, no investigation was allowed by the “Subject Minister”, who had to do exactly what the ACB told him to do in the case of a violation by any station.
Now I come to your Sunday 10th July issue of statements made by Mr. Jagdeo under the caption “Jagdeo still considering suspension”. It is very troubling, since nowhere in the law does it say that he can, to quote your newspaper, “decide if he will go ahead with the ACB’s recommendation [or not]”. He does not have that right if the ACB says suspend then he must suspend, if they say no he must not suspend!
It has been nearly a month and poor Sharma is still in limbo about what will happen to his licence.
As far as the alleged contravention of the constitution by me is concerned, I was waiting for someone to answer that part and finally yesterday (Friday 15th July, 2011) Mr. Freddie Kissoon did so in his column, and I am grateful for that.
As written on the Guyana Broadcasters’ licences, the conditions violate freedom of speech issues in a big way. As Freddie pointed out, it would be impossible for anyone not to offend someone when he/she makes a controversial public declaration in a plural society such as ours, so because private broadcasters have to purchase and pay annually for their licence, these repressive freedom of speech violations are imposed on them.
These conditions were placed there in a certain context and for a specific period. It was just after the 2001 elections, when to heal the massive rift [which Mr. Jagdeo does understand still exists in this country], these provisions were put on the licence to effect healing – since from 1997 to 2001 there cannot be any doubt about what was going on in this country as a result of the marching and the “slow fyaah and mo fyaah”.
So the ACB was never intended to last more than a few months, it has lasted 10 years. The licence acts as an effective muzzle on the broadcast media which does not apply to the print media – this is a constitutional violation since it offends equality of treatment.
As far as the constitutional breaches perpetrated by me [according to Mr. Jagdeo] they pale into insignificance when compared to the daily violation of the fundamental human rights in our constitution – maintaining the monopoly of radio is one, every day the freedom of speech rights of every single citizen in this country is violated as a result of this; denying the right of the opposition access to the state media is also a fundamental violation to freedom of speech.
This is not just my opinion, since in 1982 the judge Mr. Deyalsingh in the Rambachand case in Trinidad ruled that denying a member of the opposition in Parliament the right to speak on a state-owned media is a fundamental violation of rights, NCN is not owned by the PPP, it is owned by all of the people in this country.
It is a violation of their civil and political rights to deny them access, especially when it is their taxes which is supporting it.
Also, our constitution speaks about equality, actually it infers it, but unlike Trinidad it does not spell it out clearly, but it is my opinion that receiving the massive subventions from the budget annually, NCN is competing unfairly with private broadcasters, this offends any provision in the constitution which hints at equality of treatment.
Our constitution requires the formation of a Procurement Commission, Mr. Jagdeo has steadfastly refused to put it in place, what he has in place is a National Procurement body, which to the best of my knowledge contains not one member of the opposition, the human rights commission is also not in place – also a constitutional violation.
There are numerous other examples which the lack of space does not allow me to elaborate, but the public should look into these violations of our constitution themselves, they should make up their minds if this is the Party or the President they want running this country.
In a plural society such as this, there has to be some understanding of the complexities of the situation and that it is impossible to have prior censorship enshrined in the licences of broadcasters to be fair and balanced and not to offend.
I think that Freddie’s article captured the situation nicely, and I will end here.
Tony Vieira

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