Jagdeo shares out airwaves to friends…PM Hinds fumbles on multiple broadcast frequencies

Mar 16, 2013 News

…says issues “technical”

Prime Minister Samuel Hinds yesterday said that he sees no “big issue” over the granting of multiple broadcast frequencies to favourites of the government and former President Bharrat Jagdeo.

Prime Minister Samuel Hinds

Hinds sought to explain that multiple frequencies were granted so that the programming of the station could be relayed to other parts of the country.
But telecommunications experts say the Prime Minister does not really know what he is talking about.
Hinds Thursday disclosed that three entities were given five radio frequencies each. These are TVG, owned by Dr Ranjisinghi Ramroop, the best friend of former President Jagdeo; Telcor and Cultural Broadcasting using a contact name Omar Lochan, the Deputy Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Natural Resources under Minister Robert Persaud; and New Guyana Company Limited, owned by the ruling People’s Progressive Party (PPP), with the contact given as Dharamkumar Seeraj, a Member of Parliament for the PPP.
Hinds’s explanation that one station would operate the frequencies does not hold weight, experts say, since the one station can use another mechanism to relay its programming and does not necessarily need a frequency to do so.
What Jagdeo’s government did therefore was to grab fifteen frequencies, apart from those assigned to the state broadcaster, NCN, and others close to the government. As a result, it lessens other frequencies that are available if others are interested in radio broadcasts.
Further, those given multiple radio frequencies and links for television broadcast can use those to set up mini radio and TV stations, since they can de-link from their main transmission and send out whatever they want in different areas of the country.
While seeking to offer an explanation, the Prime Minister admitted that they were technical issues.

On Thursday, Hinds revealed that just before he left office, former President Jagdeo farmed out the airwaves to his friends, those close to the government and a few others.
Hinds revealed that apart from the five radio frequencies, Dr Ramroop has Channel 28 and three other links to that station, which could effectively allow him to broadcast across the country.
Apart from those, in the month before he left office, Jagdeo gave one radio frequency each to other persons. These are NTN Radio (Anand Persaud), Rudy Grant, Wireless Connections (Maxwell Thom), Hits and Jams Entertainment (Rawle Ferguson), Alfro Alphonso and Sons Enterprise (Alfro Alphonso), Haslyn Graham, and Little Rock Television Station (Rockliffe Christie).
In December, 2010, Jagdeo also granted two close associates of the PPP permission to broadcast television signals on the 2.5 GHz band, which allows for cable TV operations and internet-related services.
These persons were Vishok Persaud, the son of longstanding PPP stalwart Reepu Daman Persaud, and Brian Yong, who mounted the PPP platform in 1996.
Regarding television stations, the Prime Minister said that only six more television stations can be assigned using current formats for television broadcast in Guyana.
Hinds said that determining the availability of channels for broadcasting depends on many factors. These include transmitter power and specifications, height of antenna, and location of proposed transmitters.
The Prime Minister said that in the Georgetown area (the area with the highest demand), at least 10 more channels can be assigned in the VHF band (FM sound broadcasting).
However, he said that countless other radio and television channels could be made available when there is a change in broadcasting formats.
According to the Prime Minister, if Digital Terrestrial Television Broadcasting (DTTB) is introduced here, there is the potential for “hundreds of television and sound feed programmes/channels.”