News:
February 15, 2021
Minister-designate for Communication and Digitilisation, Ursula Owusu Ekuful has explained to the Appointment Committee that, radio XYZ and Gold were among the fifty one (51) defaulted commercial radio stations but not a target for closure.
Mrs Ursula made this revelation when she appeared before the Appointment Committee on Monday, February 15, 2021 for her vetting.
She further explained to the committee that, an audit was conducted in March 2017 to assess all FM radio broadcast authorization excluding public FM stations operated by the Ghana Broadcasting Cooperation (GBC) to identify stations with expired authorizations and those that have not commence operation within the stipulated period.
The former Communication Minister further breakdown the report as, One Hundred and Forty Four (144 FMs ) which were either operating with an expired authorizations or had failed to commence operation within the stipulated two year period after the grant of the license.
Again, fifty-one (51) companies had submitted uncompleted documents for renewal after the expiration of their five year mandate, Twenty-Six (26) companies applied for renewal even before the audit but no authorization was issued and they were requested to resubmit a complete applications since what they submitted were incomplete whilst eighteen had been issued provisional authorization before the audit but hadn’t paid the fees in full.
In addition, she noted that, following the recommendation of the Audit report and the decision of the Electronic Communication Tribunal in the case of the Ghana Independent Broadcasting Association verses the NCA, the Authority shut down Fifty One (51) commercial FM stations for failure to submit its complete set of renewal documents prior to expiry of their authorization which includes both Radio XYZ AND Radio Gold.
The Communication Minister-designate, Ursula Ekuful did indicated that, Radio XYZ and Radio Gold were not targeted as a special stations to close them as being mentioned, and that Fifty One (51) radio stations were shut down including Five community FM stations that failed to submit their complete set of documents during the exercise.
All these clarifications came up when the Member of Parliament for North Tongu, Samuel Okudzeto Ablakwa who is also a member of the Appointment Committee asked that per the last quarter report of 2018 by the Media Foundation for West Africa, Radio XYZ and Radio Gold were purposely targeted for a shutdown.
Kwaku Sakyi-Danso/Ghanamps.com