We’re ready for the challenges of 24-hour news channel – CORE TV News boss
What will you say CORE TV News is all about?Core TV News is a news-oriented television station. But that does not mean we do not have other programmes. We have, but they are also programmes that are news-oriented. So what I’m saying, in other words, is that whatever you see on our screen in term […]
What will you say CORE TV News is all about?
Core TV News is a news-oriented television station. But that does not mean we do not have other programmes. We have, but they are also programmes that are news-oriented. So what I’m saying, in other words, is that whatever you see on our screen in term of programming is actually what has been in the news. In a nutshell, we have 24-hours news and news-oriented programmes.
How does a viewer differentiate between news programme and news-oriented programmes?
Currently, we have what we called, Core Digest, which is our flagship news programme. Whatever is in the news, we open our studio for it by 9.00am and we have analysts coming for it, discuss it at length and proffer solutions. It also allows people to call in and make contributions. If what is in the news today, is “Ebola” “Osun election” or “Nasarawa Impeachment”, when you tune to our station that is what you will find us discussing.
In the course of doing all these, we are trying to be 100 per cent unbiased. This is because we believe in credibility. And we also won’t mind going a step further in unravelling whatever we consider as the needful. We are not a mega phone of one political party or the other. In our quest to be objective, in Ekiti State we ensure that we attached one reporter to each of the major contender. And we keep getting information from them on daily basis. That helps us not to rely on hearsay. The same was what we did in Osun currently. Then we have what is also known as “From the ivory tower”.
This has to do with the opinions of the academia on topical national issue. So by the time you tune into our station, it is like you are just watching the news. We also have others such as, “Women in Politics”, “Judiciary Today”, “Around Africa”, “Sport Updates”, among others.
You said this is a 24-hour TV station. What specifically can you say differentiates yours from similar other TV stations?
We know there are many 24-hour TV stations in Nigeria. We are not unmindful of that competition. But I can tell you that we are not running after anybody. If in less than a year of operation, we are where we are today, you can imagine with us where we will be in the next 50 years. And that is why it is not surprising that our staff strength is filled with young men and women with fresh blood who can go the extra mile.
And we have a watchword and, that is, even if there is no food in our stomachs, the office must not stop running. Of course, we realize that we can’t be everywhere as we are just starting.
Yet at the same time we appreciate the fact that this was also not our strength when we first started. We have passed through the six-month probation we set for ourselves and I can tell you that people’s reactions are coming in and are being processed.
Beyond being youthful, what uniqueness will you say is in your staff strength?
With the commencement of operation, we made it a point of duty not to recycle some of the known faces. We all know that in this part of the world, when a new TV station picks up, some of the known names in the industry would start moving en masse to join. In this case, we are making use of new people who are very agile and can go the extra mile.
Of course, you may want to ask me, if you speak like this, where do you place the importance of experience? Of course, we cannot do without that. But you know if you want to employ someone like me, I can ask you to go and bring a certain amount of money. Then, I will tell myself, ‘I have paid my dues in the industry, let me start working, the big man way’. Of course, that will affect the job.
However, if someone like me is employed and is made to work at the background, giving the initiatives to my subordinates where necessary, they will surely be encouraged. Someone like me or our Director of News and Current Affairs, Mr Emmanuel Malagu, has been in the terrain for sometimes now. In all our lives, we have not done anything else, other than news and I can tell you that it would be difficult for any of our reporters to bring something for us to process when we know such cannot fly.
Issues of ethics are quite germane in the media industry. How prepared is CORE TV News and its reporters for the challenge?
Despite being a young media establishment, I can tell you that we are putting things in the right perspective. You can quote me anywhere that our reporters are not just like any other reporters that will tell you that without monetary reward, we won’t air your story. This and many others are what we are doing to help shape Nigerian media industry.
At Core TV News, we are telling the world that we are doing something different. We are not doing news like other TV stations out there. Of course, we are evolving and we cannot say we have arrived. We are taking our steps one after the other. What you see at the moment is even a scratch on the surface. Talking about objectivity, we ensure that we keep balancing our news from time to time, meaning that we are not just one-sided.
Also, it will interest you to know that a reporter with us is not just a reporter. He goes around with a multi-task mindset. He is a multi-media journalist. We demand from our reporters that they must have a very good knowledge of their environment. Have a good knowledge of the industry you cover in term of specialisation among others.
Again, when we say we are everywhere, we mean, in terms of technology, we can file in our report from any part of the country. And in terms of foreign news, we already have an arrangement with AFP as regards that.
Why is CORE TV News operating on Startimes?
Well, we realized the tall order before us as stipulated that all TV stations in Nigeria need to migrate from analogue to digital in 2015.
And like the management of Startimes always says, “we are in business to help Nigerian TV stations migrate from analogue to digital platforms.” ITU had actually given a directive to many countries that they have to leave the analogue platform for digital so the digital platform can be used for other things. Moving to analogue comes with a number of benefits in term of stations, pictures, audio and video qualities among others.
Being on Startimes makes us national and we are on Channel 329 and I can also tell you that as a TV station, we have the power and the technical-know how to run a live transmission from anywhere.
For instance, the June 21 gubernatorial election in Ekiti state was covered live by our TV station and I can tell you that the response we have from the viewing audience especially from Ekiti was quite alarming we discovered that many of the terrestrial TV stations in the country does not enjoy the same reach as we have. And that actually brought lots of traffic to our station. The height of that for us was when the Governor-elect himself phoned-in to the programme himself the second day after the ballots had been counted.
What are the challenges you have had to contend with using this platform?
Right from the first day I started Core TV, I told myself that I had seen enough in Nigerian media industry. I had seen signals and audio-visual qualities of various types yet, I refused to be disturbed by the strength of my media provider. And I rolled out to say that what I am doing is 100 per cent HD in terms of equipment and all that.
And that is why when we first started and we package our stuff here and pushed it out for distribution. We discovered that they did not have enough bandwidth to do so. So we had to come down to 70 per cent.
Even at that, that is the clearer picture you can get for any terrestrial TV station in Nigeria.
So we had that challenge at the initial stage and that was why you could see our signals shaking. We also had audio jerking. In fact, we have had to shut down for 24 hours because we didn’t realize until later that with the volume of what we were pushing out was very powerful so we had to upgrade at that time. Another challenge we have is the issue of power. We had to rely on generator for a larger part of our broadcasting time. There are others, too, but for now, those are issues we have had to confront.
So basically, we can say CORE TV is actually on line to tap into the 2015 deadline given on the migration from analogue to digital.
When I realized that the President will be doing a switch over from terrestrial to digital on June 1, 2014 in Jos, I was very happy.
Because I had thought that for people in the area, except for those on Startime decoder, they may not be able to watch TV. But I was sad that it did not happen because there was no complete switch over due to error on the part of government or from the Startime itself. If it had happened, that would have given us more market because already we are there.