We’ve restored Pyramid FM as an independent medium – GM

How is Pyramid FM doing in Kano? When I was posted here, there were rejections internally and externally. Some of the staff knew that anyone who had worked with a foreign medium will not accept their attitude to work.  The fear among the staff was that somebody who has not been part of the FRCN […]

How is Pyramid FM doing in Kano?
When I was posted here, there were rejections internally and externally. Some of the staff knew that anyone who had worked with a foreign medium will not accept their attitude to work.  The fear among the staff was that somebody who has not been part of the FRCN family is coming with ideas that may not be palatable. Outside the station, there were politicians who had before my arrival taken Pyramid FM for granted. Because the station is owned by the Federal Government, politicians in the ruling PDP at the centre would walk in and insist on what they wanted. Seeing that I might not allow that, they kicked against my appointment. The station was featuring only PDP, making the APC Kano government and people to view it as an enemy of the state. It got to a point that the state government wrote a memo to all the state agencies not to give a single advert to Pyramid FM, which placed the station in a very difficult situation. At the time I took over as the general manager I hardly made N10,000 a week from advert. Up till now I hardly make N20,000 a week. Those who ran the station at that time were sons of the Federal Government and were given cover by those in power. They forgot that it is difficult to stay in someone’s house and pose as his enemy. The station was rejected even by the people.

How then have you been carrying on?
What I did first when I came was to reconcile the station with the state government. It got to a point that I had to invite the director general of FRCN because anywhere I went in the state I was rejected. Anywhere my staff went they were rejected. So I went to the governor with the director general. Thank God we are getting somewhere. The state government and the people are accepting us back gradually. Although the adverts have not started coming from the government, they do call us from time to time for live coverage of the governor’s functions.

What is the acceptance of your station among Kano audience?
Apart from problems the station had with the people before I took over, the station did not have saleable programmes, for which reason they could not get adverts. The only programme that I met which had listeners is Siasa Kano. As one who grew with foreign media, I knew what it takes to grab audience. Before I left Deutch Welle, in Nigeria alone we had over 40 million listeners, so I decided to use the same method. I sat to think about what ordinary people needs in Kano. First is religion; and not only Islam. I also run Christian programmes. We give everybody the leverage to learn religion on the station. Also, culture is very important to the people of Kano. I created a special programme for the Emirate without anybody giving me a penny. The Emirate is not sponsoring it. I am running it with my money. They don’t know how I buy diesel, how I pay my staff but I am doing it every Monday by 9:30 am. It tells people what Kano Emirate is all about. We have also linked up with other emirate councils to show our listeners the relationship between them and Kano Emirate. I dedicated a correspondent who has been reporting the Emirate for the past 25 years to anchor it. We also have another 30 minutes programme on Government of Kano State. I made sure our correspondent in Government House gives me details of the decisions made at the State Executive meeting every Wednesday. We also have similar one for the State House of Assembly on Sunday for 30 minutes. Nobody is giving me a kobo for any of these programmes. Another interesting one is between the rulers and the rural people. BBC did a programme on the rural people and I discovered it generated popularity so I created a programme that covers every nook and cranny of the local government areas. My reporters will go into the areas to ask common people what the chairman does and what he does not do in terms of roads, health, water and other things, after which they will meet the chairman to balance their reports. Our audience has risen since I took over. We got award from the BBC and another one from the students because it was when I came that I created English Academy and French Academy. In the past the station hardly operated for six hours a day. Either there was no diesel or the engines were down. When I came there was just N64,000 in the coffers of the station and we are not allowed to touch it. I sold my land and other properties to run the station. Although they told me it was not proper, I have no option if I must help Pyramid FM to achieve its objectives.

How many programmes does the station have?
I have created 25 new programmes since I became the GM. We now have over 60 programmes. Before I came there were many sponsored programmes but they were not properly sponsored. Many of them would run the programmes throughout the year and pay N100,000 at the end. I met some programmes which at the end they would call some people as the sponsors but they only paid N150,000 for the whole year. When I came, what I did as a newsman was to clean up the newsroom. I discovered that they were just producing bulletins. They would buy newspapers and lift stories, put it in a CD and take it to the motor park and pay a conductor N100 to drop it with the gateman when he gets to Madobi. This was how I met the newsroom and I said this cannot continue. What I did was to gather the few that are talented and give them in-house training on news sourcing. I bought computers for the newsroom and hired computer experts and connected the newsroom to a server so that anytime they produce news it can go through the internet to Madobi from where we transmit.

What effort have you made to digitalize Pyramid FM?
FRCN as the main body is almost 100 percent ready. We no longer operate manually, our works are done digitally. Now wherever you are you can tune to FRCN with your handset once you have internet facilities. The same applies to Pyramid FM here in Kano. Once you go to our website you can listen to us.