Director General of the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, Professor Amin Alhassan, says GBC cannot halve its channels of broadcasting from six to three on the National Digital Terrestrial Television platform as directed by the Communications Minister.
The State Broadcaster has therefore written to the National Media Commission (NMC) for urgent help. In a letter to the NMC, Director-General of the state broadcaster Prof. Amin Alhassan said all six channels which are GTV, GBC News, GTV Sports Plus, Obonu TV, GTV Life and Ghana Learning TV serve specific purposes, therefore, none can be taken off.
Giving a breakdown of their uses, Prof Alhassan said all six channels are dedicated 24-hours channels with “specified focus reflecting the mandate of GBC as a State Broadcaster, a Public Service Broadcaster and a Commercial Broadcaster.
In view of this, GBC is unable to respond to the request of the Minister of Communication.
The directive from the Communications Minister, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful said the intention to reduce the number of channels GBC currently operates is to ensure “there is enough redundancy on the national Digital Terrestrial Television platform which is currently at full capacity. The directive which was given on June 26 this year is to take effect 60 days from the said date. But GBC says none of its six channels can be taken off.
He said complying to the request by the Minister means GBC has to reduce its operations by half. The request according to the Director General will also impose serious budgetary and human resource challenges on the operations of GBC and indeed, can collapse the Public Service Broadcaster.
Prof Alhassan noted that the GBC Board expects the NMC to intervene to save the State Broadcaster from the consequences of having to operate with only three Television channels.
