The incompetence of the government, and especially the NFMU, is frightening

May 02, 2013 Letters

---

DEAR EDITOR,
I was out of the country during the ending of March to around the middle of April this year, and so I am responding to two matters which were printed in the newspapers in Guyana.
The first, a letter, concerns my relationship with Brian Yong. I have never established any contractual relationship with Yong and so I have never worked for him, Yong approached me in 2006/7 and wanted to use my installation, including security, transmission tower, dishes, electricity etc. at Versailles, including two used dishes which he got from Esso or Shell, and which I assembled at the Versailles transmission site.
My son and I worked on this project spending several million dollars of our money and hundreds of hours of our time installing the dishes and modifying Versailles to accommodate Yong’s operations and to the best of my knowledge, since it was the start-up time of his operations and Yong claimed that he was cash strapped, we were never paid for the use of our infrastructure or our work in the nearly three years that we laboured on this project.
I understand, since I have never seen it, that the writer made some very disparaging remarks about me in that letter, and I was advised by the people who relayed the contents of the letter to my attention, that I should respond to the allegations legally, I have opted not to do so, since people in this country have been accustomed to the lies and dishonesty of the corrupt people/government officials perpetrate against people who expose the corruption of the PPP. They also told me that they were surprised that the Stabroek News would publish an unsigned letter with such defamatory remarks about me.
Secondly, I would like to state that I am not the authority in Guyana which issue Radio licences to people, and I am aware that at the time of the sale of the Vieira Communications Limited (VCL) shares to Dr Ranjisinghi ‘Bobby’ Ramroop on June 3rd 2009, Vieira Communications Limited had a case pending in the appeal court demanding that it be given a licence to broadcast a radio signal in Guyana, which it was pursuing since 1993.
The Appeal Court delivered its judgement on the 14th October 2009, stating VCL’s rights were violated and that it was entitled to a radio licence, and directed the National Frequency Management Unit (NFMU) to award a Radio frequency to it.  I believe that we were using FM 100.1 when the equipment was seized illegally by the NFMU. Ramroop, as the owner of the shares in VCL would have been entitled to that radio licence. But not if what I suspect happened.
The public would remember that in 2008 Mr. C. N. Sharma had started to broadcast channel 4 from his Robb Street installation and the government stopped him from doing so, since they alleged that Robb Street was not the location from which channel 4 was supposed to be broadcast; that no one could sell or move a channel from its current location since no new licences would be issued for Radio or for Television until a proper Broadcast Authority was formed.
Yet I see that in the libel case between Anthony Vieira, Channel 9 and the Stabroek News and QAII and Ramroop, action #641-W2011, that  Ramroop in his sworn statement of claim warranted that the company, Vieira Communications Limited, was changed to Television Guyana Inc. as of the 10th January 2010!
So Mr. Sharma and the rest of us who were trying to expand our service were prevented from doing so, since the government’s position at that time was that no new licences could be issued until the Broadcast Authority was formed, whilst at the same time, Ramroop was allowed to change the name of this company from Vieira Communications Limited, which held the channel 28 broadcast licence, to Television Guyana Inc. This would have, of necessity, caused a new licence with a new name to be issued. But no new licences were to be issued until the authority was formed!! How can anyone reconcile these contradictions?
It is my opinion that the law was violated for this to happen, if indeed it did, since the change of name was not possible without the issuing of a new licence. If a new licence was issued as of the date 10th January 2010, then the entity, TVG, has been operating illegally in this country.
Just as the case about the issuance of the 11 radio licences is currently being challenged in the courts, this change of name should also be challenged by the same group pursuing the matter legally.  And the question should be asked in Parliament what is the name on the licence for channel 28 now, and what is the name on the licence that is on the radio frequency issued to Ramroop.
If it was Vieira Communications Ltd., which had applied to get a broadcast radio licence since 1993, and was awarded that licence in 2009 by the Appeal Court, this meant that it would have been first in line to receive a radio licence. But since these people can do anything since Jagdeo became president, by changing the name of the company to which the Appeal Court granted a radio licence, then Ramroop moved from the front of the line to the back of it, since he gave up the right of being the first among equals by getting the government to change the company’s name, when so many of them were denied the same request.
Trinity Broadcasting Network was removed from Guyana by Jagdeo, since prompted by him, the NFMU alleged that for seven years it was broadcasting from Versailles instead of from Alberttown, which was the registered place on the licence.  This denied over 200,000 Christians their religious channel.
We are beating around the bush in these matters. We should lance the head of the abscess and demand that the Director of Public Prosecutions charge this man Jagdeo with the numerous misdemeanours in public office, to undo all of the shenanigans he perpetrated against the people whilst in office. Even if it is to teach others that the immunities of the president do not mean that they are allowed to break the law with impunity; that it is there for entirely a different reason.
And as soon as possible, these immunities must withdrawn from our constitution, since we have seen what can happen when it is in the hands of a man like Jagdeo. What if the radio licences are declared illegal? Will the opposition have the guts to demand that the DPP charge Jagdeo? That has got to be the logical conclusion of that matter. If he issued licences against the law he should answer for it. And will they just go up to the Chief Justice and stop or will they do the proper thing and go all the way to the CCJ?
I see a lot of hogwash that people are given five FM frequencies since they have to repeat the signal across the country. This is absolute nonsense. There are microwave links which are available in the final acts of the International Telecommunications Union set aside for this purpose, and since the radio signal is so narrow, buying satellite time to take the signal across Guyana is probably far more economical than using different frequencies and repeaters, especially since we do not see that the five channels awarded to Ramroop, as far as we know, are not divided into broadcast [primary] and repeater [secondary] frequencies.
In any event, can you imagine going to Berbice and looking for your favourite channel which is supposed to be 100.1 and can’t find it in Berbice because there it’s 78.9? And this can happen for 10 or 15 stations!
The incompetence of the government of this country and especially the NFMU is frightening!
Also, can you imagine that you are in Linden and you are listening to 98.1 Hot FM from Georgetown and since these idiots are repeating, using the FM band, its coming over on 106.4, and whilst you are tuning to seek it you kill someone on the road?
As far as Ramroop having an uplink to transmit channel 28 by satellite all over Guyana is concerned, and that it was that which made the government decide to approach him to allow them to uplink the satellite signal for the learning channel from Ramroop’s location in Ruimveldt, this is smoke and mirrors.
I believe that they decided to give him this uplink to make even more money. Apparently no amount is too much, and when he bought it they are now saying that he already had it and that’s why he was given the contract to activate it. This had to be what happened, since up to this time, 2013, channel 28 is not being uplinked to any satellite since it is very expensive and there is no legitimate income from local TV to allow it to pay for the satellite time which would receive this signal and send it back to earth.
This brings up a new question. They are paying Ramroop G$3.6 million per month to uplink this learning channel, who is paying the estimated 15,000 US dollars a month to rent the satellite transponder? Ramroop or the Guyanese taxpayers? Satellite time is very expensive for television, but not for radio, since the radio signal is so small.
I know that in 2009 when the shares of channel 28 were transferred to Ramroop, I did not have such an uplink, in fact no one, except GT&T, was supposed to have an uplink and the NFMU would have had to give permission to import it. Do we have evidence that this happened?
And I believe that GT&T would also have had to give permission, since their monopoly included all uplinks for everything – telephone, television etc.  Do we have evidence that they gave permission? And if GT&T had given permission for their monopoly to be broken in this manner (since it is my belief that once it is broken it is broken) did they or the government inform Digicel?
Finally, since we are dealing with this matter, wireless cable should not have been awarded to two operators in the same primary zone, the band is too small. So we have two close associates of the PPP operating two wireless cable systems, and since they are operating in the same band, the Guyanese people will be subjected to having 60 channels from each operator with much repetition, since they both have CNN, HBO etc, instead of 120 channels from a proper operator who we must treat like a public utility, and be regulated by the Public Utilities Commission.
In Guyana, to legitimise the Stabroek News’ satellite delivery of Direct TV, they have to pay the government 4% of their cross annual income, in addition to the copyright for those signals!! How much are Brian Yong and Vishok Persaud required to pay?
Remember that, in the example of Jamaica, the principle was that for the payment of the published sum, someone bought the exclusive rights to supply cable for a period of 15 years, i.e. a monopoly, one construes from this that if the entity does not serve the public’s interest properly, the government reserves the right to grant the franchise to someone else at the end of the 15-year period. In this case in Guyana, these men, Yong and Persaud, were given a monopoly without any provision for renewal or payment to the government coffers, forever!
The biggest joke is when Jagdeo called in all operators and told them that the “Wild West” going on in broadcasting must not be allowed to happen in cable as well. So his idea of regulation to the sector was to award it as gifts to two friends and leave everyone else out. These two don’t have the rights for the Demerara region alone. The rights as we understand it, are that both Yong and Persaud can deliver cable nationally!
And telling the public that it’s okay to kill the TV broadcasters with fees, both to the NFMU and now to the Broadcast authority, is okay. But it is not okay in the case of our cable operators, according to Sam Hinds, since they serve such small amounts of people. Yes Sam, and pigs fly!
Tony Vieira

 

 

---

---