STATEMENT BY THE GHANA INDEPENDENT BROADCASTERS ASSOCIATION (GIBA) ON THE DIRECTIVES ISSUED BY THE MINISTRY OF COMMUNICATIONS TO CRYSTAL TELEVISION AND THE STATE BROADCASTER, GHANA BROADCASTING CORPORATION

The Ghana Independent Broadcasters Association (GIBA) has learnt with deep concern, the directives issued by the Minister responsible for Communications, Mrs. Ursula Owusu-Ekuful requiring Crystal TV which is a member of GIBA, and the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC), the state broadcaster, to surrender two and three of their broadcast channels respectively. The justification given for this directive include the creation of redundancy on the Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) transmission infrastructure which, according to the Minister is currently operating at full capacity and the need for a channel through which the government can communicate to Ghanaians.

Foremost among GIBA’s concerns is the attempt by the Ministry of Communications to control the operation of media houses contrary to the letter and spirit of the 1992 Constitution. In both directives issued to GBC and Crystal TV by Mrs. Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, she directs them to consolidate their programming in line with the directive.

Both media houses have objected to the directive. GBC has petitioned the National Media Commission (NMC), the constitutional body charged with the responsibility of insulating the state-owned media from governmental control, and promoting and ensuring the freedom and independence of the media for mass communication or information asking them to intervene to prevent the enforcement of the Minister’s directives which they consider will impose serious budgetary and human resource challenges on their operations and could potentially collapse the Public Service Broadcaster.

Crystal TV has expressed its inability to comply with the directive citing obvious deleterious impact on its business which has been running for the past 25 years and drawing attention to the fact that its channels earned their place on the National DTT platform by virtue of being existing analogue broadcasters prior to the development of the DTT Platform and having complied with all applicable regulatory requirements.

GIBA’s concern stems from a consistent pattern of efforts on the part of the current Ministry of Communications to establish control over the Ghanaian media through the DTT infrastructure. This unfortunate posture first manifested when upon taking over as Minister, Mrs. Ursula Owusu-Ekuful decided to throw overboard all understandings reached by stakeholders to ensure that free-to-air broadcasting, which is mass media press services, classified by the NCA to be delivered in the clear without encryption and without the payment of any kind of fees for accessing its programme content, remains free, as the nation migrates from analogue to digital broadcasting.

The Honourable Minister appears determined to replace this critical broadcast service to the nation with Pay TV services with her planned introduction of Conditional Access as a control mechanism of the DTT platform and her introduction of foreign consultants (Inview Technologies), who are her technical advisers and whose core businesses are in the operations of Pay TV services, in sharp contrast with Ghana’s Digital Terrestrial Television setup to serve Free-To-Air broadcasting. As a matter of fact, recently on an interview programme with TV3 network, the Minister stated publicly that some of the capacity that they have decided to free up will be given out to Pay TV operators.

The Ministry also sought to set up the management board with a wholly owned government entity, whose Governing board is to be appointed by the President without recourse to the National Media Commission as would be expected for a state-owned media.

The second and third control tool sought to be established is the implementation of the proposed Conditional Access (CA) module on the headend of the DTT infrastructure to encrypt broadcast content delivered by Free-to-Air (FTA) television broadcasters and the corresponding CA decrypting system to be embedded in the consumer’s Set-Top Box (STB) without which one cannot view Free-to-Air television in this country. As has been explained in previous publications, the Conditional Access encryption places control in the hands of the CA software provider, a foreign entity through whom Free-to-Air television content can be blocked or unblocked through the vagaries, caprices and fancies of government.

It has always been difficult to explain for the common understanding of the Ghanaian public, the control impact of Conditional Access because of the many unavoidable technical jargons. The latest directives issued by the Ministry of Communications, however brings home the concern of inappropriate control and compromise of the independence of the media which GIBA has been pointing out over the past few years. It is revealing that even before the technological tool of control is brought on board the Ministry of Communications has manifested its appetite to control the operation of broadcasting services in a worrying fashion by demanding the termination of five mass media broadcast channels ostensibly to create a redundancy on the DTT Platform.

MoC’s Justification for its Directives

A number of reasons have been assigned for the directives issued to the two broadcasters. One is that the National DTT platform is currently at full capacity and the directive to surrender channels is meant to ensure that there is redundancy on the platform. It is difficult to accept that this is the true reason for asking GBC and Crystal TV to give up a total of five channels when one is confronted by the fact that at the time of commencing the operations of the DTT platform, there were only 15 analogue channels which were transitioned onto the digital platform. How did we get to the place where the platform is filled up to capacity by the addition of 25 more channels? Were considerations of redundancy not on table at the time the new applications were being considered?

Another justification given was that it was important for government to have a channel to disseminate information without having to pay for the services. This justification is equally curious. What better channel could government use to disseminate its information than the state broadcaster’s channels? GBC has played this role as government broadcaster from its inception till date and has grown over the years culminating in the current 6 channels of broadcast which the MoC now seeks to halve. It is instructive to note that in the Ministry’s DTT Policy published on its website on 5^th March 2020, it proposes the imposition of a “shall carry” obligation on all licensed TV network operators who will be required to carry one channel of the State which will be decided upon by the responsible Ministry in collaboration with GBC at no cost. The channel of the State Broadcaster which must be carried by all licensed TV network operators will have no adverts and will be sponsored by the Government of Ghana. Clearly the intention to implement a “shall carry” obligation has only one purpose which is to enable government information and communications to reach the general public. This justification given for the directive to surrender channels is therefore completely flawed and is unsupported by the Ministry’s own policy on the Digital Terrestrial Television migration.

Usurpation of the Role of the National Communications Authority

The directives issued by the Ministry, if enforced would amount to a termination of the broadcast authorisation issued by the National Communications Authority (NCA) to Crystal TV. This is so because analogue broadcast operators are being required to surrender their analogue frequencies in exchange for a place on the DTT platform. FTA Operators are therefore on the DTT platform by virtue of the Free-to-Air DTT Authorisation issued to them by the NCA. In the event that the operators fail to comply with the conditions of their authorisation, operators would be entitled to some due process before their authorisation could be withdrawn and only then could they lose their place on the DTT platform.  GIBA therefore considers the directives issued by the Ministry as a usurpation of the role of the NCA in the regulation of spectrum for the broadcasting industry.

GIBA acknowledges the oversight responsibility of the Minister of Communications for the communications sector and the power of the Minister to make policies. GIBA further acknowledges the power of the Minister to give written directives to the Board of the National Communications Authority on matters of policy to which the Board shall comply. GIBA however thinks that it is quite a stretch of the Minister’s powers under the Act to be issuing directives directly to broadcasters without recourse to the NCA and requiring them to surrender channels and shut down their TV stations.

The attempt by the Ministry of Communications to have control over the Digital Terrestrial Television platform, is nothing more than taking back the freedoms that we long fought for and thereby undermining the Constitution. We cannot separate the tools we use to deliver mass media information from the contents that it carries. Delivering mass media services is working with tools in a value chain. If you take down one, you are taking down all and our freedoms will be gone forever.

GIBA believes it is time we all rose up as a nation to defend our freedoms guaranteed under the Constitution. We should be vigilant about what digital technology offers to the world, as it is also capable of taking away all the good things that we have already achieved, because people with parochial interests can take advantage of our ignorance of technology to negatively exploit us and our unborn generations.

In view of the foregoing, it is heart-warming that His Excellency the President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has directed the Minister for Communications to suspend the implementation of the directives given to the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation in connection with the reduction of its channels on the DTT platform pending further consultation with stakeholders. It is however regrettable that the directives stopped short of addressing the directives similarly given to Crystal Television to shut down two of its channels. GIBA requests from the Minister responsible for Communications to withdraw the directives as they have clearly been issued in error of the laws governing the sector and the justification given for doing so are evidently flawed. GIBA would also use this opportunity to urge the Ministry of Communications to take a step back and to reflect on the series of actions called into question in this statement which have the tendency to undermine media freedom and independence as well as the insulation of state owned media from governmental control as stipulated in the 1992 Constitution of the Republic of Ghana.