Hurdles before new media chiefs
VON: Poor funding a tough issue Of the six information-related organisations that got new chief executives this past week, the Voice of Nigeria (VON) appears to be among the most poorly funded. VON was planned to be like the top world media outfits. Far from that, the organisation today merely struggles to remain on air […]
VON: Poor funding a tough issue
Of the six information-related organisations that got new chief executives this past week, the Voice of Nigeria (VON) appears to be among the most poorly funded. VON was planned to be like the top world media outfits.
Far from that, the organisation today merely struggles to remain on air a number of hours a day broadcasting to predictably few listeners. And the problem has been under-funding by the federal government which owns it, a situation not helped by its establishment law which bars it from raising money for itself.
“VON on its own as the sole agency charged with international radio broadcasting is not permitted to have content to do with paid advert and we cannot even establish subsidiaries such as FM stations which could make money for us, so we simply have to rely on often limited funding from the federal government,” Mr. Ahaziah Suleiman, an executive of the organisation, said.
Mr Suleiman who was the acting DG of VON until the naming of the new DG, spoke to Daily Trust in an interview early in March, comparing VON with the FRCN, Nigeria’s national radio station, which not only thrives on adverts and other commercial contents but also owns FM stations in many parts of the country that make money for the station.
He explained that VON is mandated by the very letters of its creation to be busy only at putting Nigeria in the best of light externally and is not allowed to spend time struggling to make money as soliciting and airing advertisements require.
NTA: Gov’t influence a drawback
The challenge with the Nigerian Television Authority, (NTA), in the point of view of many, has long been its subservience to the federal government that owns it.
Mr Tonnie Iredia, a columnist and former Director-General of the organisation, said emphatically that NTA’s problem is government control.
Government control comes in various forms, but the one that manifests most is the open support favouring officials of government. This affects the station’s creditability and patronage in predictable ways.
Forms of controls that are hidden from public view similarly drag the station down, according to Iredia, who, recalling his time as the DG, said in one of his recent writings, the NTA is hardly allowed to recruit the best applicants into its fold because most applicants who get recruited come from the executive and legislative arms of government.
A staff of the NTA who spoke in confidence said the challenges before the new DG “are enormous” and transcend staff welfare issues. “This digitalization that they are talking about, I doubt very much if NTA is ready,” the staff said, adding that even the basic working tools that other broadcast organisations take for granted have for long been scarce commodities for NTA crews.”
He said the situation had been depriving the NTA of many of its best hands. “People are leaving. Many of the best hands are leaving to emerging TV stations that pay better and provide better working environments,” he said.
NOA: Lack of overhead crippling programme execution
If the NTA is hampered by material resources to do great broadcasting, the National Orientation Agency, (NOA), is badly crippled by poor funding. Sources within the agency told Daily Trust on Sunday that overhead expenditure provision is near nil, making it impossible for the agency to run even its most basic enlightenment programmes.
“There is no overhead, no money; they simply don’t push money for us to do what we’ve been mandated to do,” a staff said, asking, “Can you imagine the federal government asking us to work and providing us nothing to do the work? Can you imagine a situation recently when we went for a mobilization programme in a community and had to contribute money from our private pockets to pay for television coverage? That’s how bad it is. That’s why Nigerians hardly know these days that NOA exists. It is up to the new DG to convince the Buhari government to make a difference by funding NOA.”
The staff said it would help the NOA better if the federal government would move it from the Ministry of Information & Culture and place it directly under the Presidency.
NBC: Staff expect new DG to make digitalization work
At the National Broadcasting Commission, (NBC), a prominent corporate wish is the successful execution of the digitalization programme of the federal government. And with the naming of the new DG, Malam Is’shaq Modibbo Kawu, comes the expectation that the programme which failed the first target last year will meet next year’s deadline.
“We believe Modibbo Kawu will see digital switchover through,” Malam Awwalu Salihu, the NBC’s Director of Public Communications said.
Nigeria is expected to complete the transition from analogue to digital broadcasting on June 17, 2017. The process to meet the new deadline had already started in Jos and Abuja and Lagos are expected to join the train soon.
NAN: Failing content quality and need for rebirth
The News Agency of Nigeria, (NAN), is a wire news medium increasingly criticised for decreasing content quality. Many within the organisation flayed the immediate past MD, Ima Niboro, for not only turning the agency into a campaign tool for the immediate past adminsitration but for also doing nothing to at least maintain the standards of news gathering and writing.“Quality suffered a huge blow while it lasted here, especially towards the election when all caution was thrown overboard and everything was done to please the characters in or around Aso Rock,” a staff of the news agency said shortly after Niboro was removed last year.
The new DG is expected to change the situation. A reporter with the agency said he was encouraged when the new Director-General, Mr Bayo Onanuga, spoke during his first visit to the agency after he was announced as the new boss. The reporter said, “…the new managing director said he had always been a consumer of NAN’s news and knows what the quality is now as contrasted from what it was. I believe the new MD will recreate NAN.”
FRCN: Not independent enough
Staff of the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria, (FRCN), believed that considering his background in BBC Hausa Service, the new Director-General, Mansur Liman, has the wherewithal to handle the challenges FRCN faces.
A worker at one of the FM stations of the radio organisation said, “We are confident that with his background as a broadcaster, he won’t need much time to determine what must be done and do them appropriately.”
Citing material challenges which she said she expected the new DG to address, she specified that: “We need working equipment, modern materials that will enhance the quality of our broadcasts.”
For outsiders, however, the FRCN is not as it should be when it comes to the independence from the federal government that owns it, for which reason it is unable to do its broadcasts with the professionalism and quality it requires.
A communication specialist with the Department of Mass Communication of the University of Jos, Dr John Galadima said that for the FRCN, NTA, NAN and VON to hold their own, they would need to move with emerging trends. He said, “In this digitalised broadcasting and internet days when people have so many alternatives to the traditional media, these government media houses should know better than tie themselves to the wishes of government if they want to get anywhere.”