KEEP THE PRESSURE UP. THE THEFS MUST KNOW WHEN THEY ARE WRONG.

Media refuse to accept biased distribution of radio licences

…Press Association calls for overseas intervention

Revelations that former President Bharrat Jagdeo farmed out radio and television licences to his friends and others close to the government just before the last elections have sparked widespread concerns and a statement of defiance from privately-owned media houses.
Yesterday, the Guyana Media Proprietors Association (GMPA) and Guyana Press Association (GPA) issued statements calling for an immediate reversal of the allocations.
Several private media houses and personalities who had applied for licences and are seen as critics of the government were bypassed by Jagdeo. The former President approved the licences as Minister of Information shortly before his constitutional term in office ended in November, 2011.
According to GMPA, the “lawlessness” must end. The body said that it is “appalled at the revelations in the National Assembly on the recent allocation of radio licences.”
Three of the stations issued licences under Jagdeo have already started broadcasting.
GMPA said that the manner in which the allocations were made “flies in the face of freedom of expression. It will not be accepted. It would effectively limit objective voices. It smacks of deceit, duplicity, and downright discrimination. Effectively, then President Jagdeo breached the agreement between himself and Desmond Hoyte in 1997.”
GMPA is convinced that there was deliberate bias in the process when Jagdeo refused to issue licences to the others.
“We demand the right to free and independent voices.”
Already, members of the GMPA have met to discuss the way forward.
Meanwhile, the GPA in a separate statement, said it is disturbed over what appears to be the unfair distribution of frequencies, weighed in favour of the governing party.

The association yesterday called on overseas media bodies to intervene.
On Friday, the Association of Caribbean Media Workers (ACM), of which GPA is part, also said that it is monitoring the situation and is concerned. The association’s President, Wesley Gibbings, who is based in Trinidad, said that the ACM has been keeping an eye on the developments.  The body is preparing to issue a statement shortly.
“It is equally disturbing that the Government of Guyana is creating a media environment of monopoly ownership and control that leaves media workers limited options on employment and creative outlets for their skill and talent,” the GPA stated
An under-pressure government, with a one-seat minority in the National Assembly, was forced to disclose specific details of the licences granted following questions by the Opposition demanding answers.
GPA also pointed out that Prime Minister, Samuel Hinds, in releasing details of the allocation, did not explain why for over two decades there has been no national plan to allow for investment in the sector by Guyanese and CARICOM nationals.
It referred to recent disclosures that China’s CCTV was allowed to use a channel, reportedly allocated to the state-owned National Communications Network (NCN) under strange circumstances.
“The Guyana Press Association is also concerned that at least one TV channel has been farmed out to essentially carry international content from a foreign power that clearly does not bring employment or other tangible benefits to the Guyanese media fraternity.”
GPA called on the Government to correct the “obvious lapses” in the administration of the broadcast/telecommunications sector in the country.
“The Guyana Press Association would like to see the elected representatives from both sides of the House (the National Assembly) engaged with other stakeholders in the process to redress the deficiencies in the sector. 
“We encourage the involvement of Caribbean and Commonwealth media advisers in this task to ensure the equitable distribution of the resources of the electromagnetic spectrum that would redound to the benefit of all media workers and those involved in the creative industry.”
The granting of the licences to close friends and party members by Jagdeo is widely seen as a move by the party to further consolidate its control on the media.
Following the ruling party’s loss of its control of the National Assembly, the private media was blamed.

This is what the Jagdeo / Cabal is doing to Guyana.

why uncle Ramu the DUCK singing to BABBY song sheet?

excerpts  sources:

http://caribbeanlifenews.com/s...uyana_patrimony.html

March 21, 2013 / Business / Caribbean / People / Guyana

Tension rises in Guyana

By Bert Wilkinson

A major row is simmering in Guyana over the hogging of radio broadcast licenses by mostly Indo Guyanese businessmen and politicians, is fueling a growing belief that a small cabal of top officials is slowly executing a long-conceived plan to steal or control all the key resources of Guyana including the lucrative telecommunications sector among other state patrimonies.

Bombarded by criticism last week of its handling of the issue and demands from opposition politicians, government was forced to publish a previously secret list and with details of people awarded radio licenses. It clearly showed that people-of Indian ancestry were given multiple licenses while others, including Black and mixed raced groups were only awarded single broadcast spectrum licenses.

This new revelation surfaces as tension is rising in the country over allegations of runaway corruption, such as the running of an alternative state treasury and slush funds by government and a rush by politicians and connected businessmen and women to grab as much as they could of the country’s wealth, in the event that the governing People’s Progressive Party (PPP) loses power through the ballot or through extra-parliamentary measures.

“This is a clear move by Indian supremacist to take the country,” said newspaper columnist and former University of Guyana Professor Freddie Kissoon. “Most of the non-Indians who got licenses only got only a single one, while many of the Indians got as many as five. The plan is clear,” Kissoon said.

Black activist Barrington Braithwaite who has also campaigned against the political and other excesses of PPP in recent years, thinks that apart from the perceived Indo cabal moving in on the country’s resources, what is happening in Guyana now is a ”case of kindred habits” coming together to divide the country as they see fit.

He pointed out that some Blacks who chose to align themselves with the Indo-dominated PPP among the beneficiaries as trinkets are rouinely thrown the way of favored Indians, but he was also forced to acknowledge that all the Afros awarded radio permits only got a single one, compared to the multiple licenses awarded to Indo individuals or groups.

One of the groups awarded five licenses is linked to Natural Resources Minister Robert Persaud and his Deputy Permanent Secretary Omkar Lochan. Locan is the brother-in-law of Education Minister Priya Manikchand, while another Radio Guyana Inc. individual is connected to Ranji Ramroop, the best friend of former President Bharrat Jagdeo.

The licenses were awarded just before Jagdeo’s mandatory two terms expired in late 2011 but its details were kept secret until veteran television broadcaster Enrico Woolford publicly demanded that the list be published, winning support from rights activists and legislators.

Since then, a clearly embarrassed Prime Minister Samuel Hinds told parliament that additional licenses would be awarded, but did not say that a new fiber-optic cable being run through the jungle from Brazil to Guyana, will pave the way for connected PPP businessmen to offer US-style triple-play communications, including cable TV, telephone and internet services.

A number of companies which had been tipped off about the project long before it was announced have already installed the necessary infrastructure. In essence, government has provided the $35M to run the cable so that connected businessmen could set up triple-play services.

“This means, again, that a small group will have a monopoly on telecommunications services. This is unacceptable and discriminatory,” said Woolford.

©2013 Community Newspaper Group

This thread is about Mahen talking to himself using two of his FIVE handles. 

He was busy here promoting AFC, and turning up the heat on PPP.     Maybe he was promised a MOP job if AFC wins next election.  

LOL. 

AFC busted.