…five years of political squabbling seen as main reason
…more than a year after NCN’s management ‘failed’ to sign over assets
….Region 10 Leaders now have to seek permission to air content on a channel owned by them
By Svetlana Marshall
Fourteen months after a Deed of Gift was drafted to sign over the assets of the National Communications Network (NCN) Linden Branch to the Linden Broadcasting Network (LBN) in keeping with a commitment made under the August 21, 2012 Agreement, it has not been finalised or signed.
LBN’s Board of Trustees is now actively considering the option of writing President Irfaan Ali with the anticipation that he would intervene at a time when the regional and local leaders have to seek permission from the State to air content on a channel owned by the people of Linden, Region 10 but is operated by NCN.
The commitment to hand over the assets of NCN Linden Branch, including the building in which it occupies, was made by the A Partnership for National Unity + Alliance For Change (APNU+AFC) Government after it took office in 2015 in keeping with the August 2012 Agreement between the then People’s Progressive Party/Civic (PPP/C) Government and the Region 10 Regional Democratic Council (RDC).
It was the August 2012 Agreement that had brought an end to a month-long protest in the mining town, which turned violent after ranks of the Guyana Police Force shot and killed three men, who were among hundreds of Lindeners peacefully protesting on the Mackenzie-Wismar Bridge on July 18, 2012. The historic agreement included, among other things, the establishment of a Broadcast Committee responsible for the return of the Linden Television Station to the people of the town. But even though the agreement was signed under the PPP/C Administration, little progress was made to fully operatinalise it in fulfilling the commitment made thereunder, on the part of the then.
APNU+AFC, upon taking Office in 2015, had vowed to make good on the 2012 Agreement. By March 1, 2019, LBN was issued with its broadcast license by the Guyana National Broadcasting Authority (GNBA) to transmit its television signal on Channel 13, which was originally assigned to Green Construction but was donated in the 1980s, as a gift, to the bauxite workers and the residents of Linden.
In an interview with Village Voice News, Franklin (Bobby) Vieira, who was hired in March 2019, as a Consultant to aid in the operationalisation of LBN, said the David Granger Administration, in an attempt to make good on its promise, not only made available a $45M grant for the acquisition of equipment but pledged to handover the assets of NCN Linden Branch to LBN.
By December 2019, a legal team, reportedly on the instructions of the Board and Management of NCN, had drafted a Deed of Gift to handover the assets of its Linden Branch, including its building, to LBN but with the understanding that NCN would be given a space within the very building, located at Riverside Drive, Watooka, Linden, to broadcast on Channel 8.
“The Deed of Gift was already prepared; it was prepared between NCN and LBN, all that needed to happen was that the Deed of Gift should have been signed and submitted to the Deeds Registry and all the appropriate and relevant authorities for the handing over, that never happened,” Vieira told Village Voice News as he waved a copy of the draft document.
It is unclear why the Deed was never signed by the Management of NCN, whose Chief Executive Officer (CEO), at the time, was Veteran Broadcaster and Journalist, Enrico Woolford. Woolford, who had cosigned a letter along with NCN’s Human Resources Manager Lissette Nurse, had made reference to the “transition” in a correspondence to NCN Linden Branch Manager Reycia Nedd.
“This serves to confirm the transition of the National Communications Network Inc. Branch Office Linden to the Linden Broadcast Network. As a result, of this transition at our branch office in Linden your services with NCN will be terminated on March 31, 2020,” a section of the letter dated January 2, 2020 read. Nedd’s service, however, was not terminated. She, along with her staff, has been retained by NCN.
While stating that he has “absolutely no idea” why the Deed was not signed, Vieira laid the blame squarely at the feet of NCN. According to him, throughout the process, the Management of NCN, at the time, dragged its feet on the matter. “There was some reluctance, I think, on the part of the management of NCN to sign over the facility to LBN,” the Consultant posited.
When contacted by Village Voice News, Woolford, who has since parted ways with NCN, declined to comment on the matter. “I don’t have any comment,” Woolford told this newspaper.
LIMITED ACCESS TO BROADCAST INFORMATION
With the Deed not signed, and a change in government following the March 2020 General and Regional Elections, the Board of Trustees, which comprises the Regional Chairman, Deron Adams (Chairman); Member of Parliament, Jermaine Figueira (Secretary) and Mayor of Linden, Waneka Arrindell (Board Director) held talks with the Minister within the Office of the Prime Minister with responsibility for Public Affairs, Kwame McCoy and the Management of NCN, with the view of having the transition completed. At that meeting, it was agreed that the two companies – NCN and LBN – would co-exist until further notice.
But the regional and local leaders, it would appear, have found themselves in a quagmire, where, despite being the Trustees of LBN and Channel 13, now have to seek approval from the Management of NCN to broadcast programmes on Channel 13. This approval system is being imposed on the leaders and people of Linden, Region 10 notwithstanding the fact that everything, except the building and Channel 8 transmitter, is owned by LBN.
Contextualising the issue, Vieira said that in March, 2019 NCN’s Linden Branch was in deplorable condition. “Everything was obsolete; things were not working, no cameras, nothing,” he recalled.
He said with the understanding that the assets of the branch would have been transferred to LBN, the local network used its $45M grant from the Government of the day to rehabilitate, refurbish and equip the building at Watooka with state-of-the art equipment inclusive of new transmitters, cameras and lighting facilities.
Vieira said to further compound the situation, NCN has put no mechanism in place to transfer revenues to LBN for advertising and programmes broadcast on Channel 13, leaving the local station financially challenged.
“LBN is an independent company and they should have been able to conduct their business but what happened, or never stopped, was that all of the financial revenues that were paid into whether it was LBN or NCN was collected by NCN; so LBN has no way of receiving revenues, expanding or doing production because everything goes to NCN [but] it is LBN’s equipment,” Vieira explained. In fact LBN is now operating in the red. Aside from the outstanding licensing fees it owes the National Broadcasting Authority, LBN has an additional debt of $4.727M for services and equipment already provided.
Given the current challenges it faces, Vieira expressed the view that LBN, for now, is just an entity “on paper,” however, he is hopeful that the President Ali Administration would make good on the August 2012 Agreement by completing the transition process.
“It is probably obvious that they [Government] may not want to hand over the ownership of the building, but the Gift of Deed is already prepared, all that has to happen, is, it has to be signed, and placed in the Official Gazette,” the Consultant said.
UTTER SHAME
Former 10 Regional Chairman, Sharman Solomon, who had signed the 2012 Agreement alongside the then Prime Minister Samuel Hinds, told Village Voice News that “it is a travesty” and “utter shame” that the “one TV station policy” still exists in Linden.
“[The people] should have access to information, unimpeded access to information and we don’t have that today, and it is a travesty, and it is an utter shame that we don’t have that today, in Linden, in this 21st Century, that the one TV station policy still exists,” Solomon told Village Voice News.
He said it would appear that the Region has regressed. “I think it is offensive on behalf of the community, that today, we are no better than we were [in 2012], to the point where we are still having the Director of the Leader of the Opposition complaining about having filtered information before it could get to the people,” Solomon told this publication.
Solomon said the regional leaders should explain to the people of Linden and by extension Region 10, why the current situation exists, when weeks before the 2015 General and Regional Elections, the Region 10 Broadcasting Inc., as it was then called, had completed a transmission facility at Richmond Hill, and was able to broadcast at least two programmes on Channel 13, independent of NCN.
Solomon, who was the Secretary (ag) to the Region 10 Broadcasting Inc, said in addition to applying to GNBA for a Broadcast License, the company after extensive consultation with the people on the ground, aggressively moved ahead with its plans to put the TV station into operation to aid in the process of self-determination, and to safeguard the constitutional rights of citizens to access information and share ideas.
Noting that the facility at Richmond Hill was fully equipped, Solomon pointed out that a 200ft dish was erected at the site. The facility was constructed using some $700,000 – monies pooled together by the people of Linden.
“We had completed the building at Richmond Hill; we had installed all of the necessary resources such as devices, transmitters, transmission powers, and we had already moved ahead on the administrative side of it – that is the board,” Solomon further noted. According to him, the RDC was briefed on the operations of the company at every statutory meeting, and the council had offered its blessings. The Region 10 Broadcasting Inc had devised two business plans, which would have seen the people of Linden becoming shareholders and generating the necessary finance to keep the television station in operation.
Solomon said following the 2015 Elections, the new Regional Administration had recommended that the four-member Board be expanded to include other members of society, and though this recommendation was acted upon by way of a Supplemental Deed dated January 19, 2017 – the original group of leaders behind the establishment of the television station, found themselves off of the Board.
An April, 2017 meeting, intended to elect the Trustees, had ended abruptly following a disagreement on whether the leaders should be elected via secret ballot.
Solomon said the original group of trustees, which had included Pastor Morris McKinnon and former Parliamentarian Vanessa Kissoon, was never informed about the subsequent meetings for the election, and only learnt of the establishment of LBN and its Board of Trustees via the press.
But MP Figueira, who sits on LBN’s Board as the Secretary, told Village Voice News that while he cannot explain why the original group of Trustees or Directors was excluded from the Board, it was important to move the process forward.
It was explained that the current composition of the Board allows for the appointment of elected officials holding public offices , but importantly, would prevent any single person from establishing ownership or shareholding of the company.
MP Figueira said LBN’s Board of Trustees not only lobbied Government for a Broadcasting License but also for funding by way of grants and annual subventions, and the transfer of the assets of NCN Linden Branch located both at Watooka and Richmond Hill.
“We were negotiating not only for the NCN building in Watooka but also for the assets at Richmond Hill where the dish and the building were. We were negotiating for all of the assets,” MP Figueira said while noting that the negotiation between LBN and the APNU+AFC Government was expansive.
Amid criticisms that the Regional and Local leaders had not done enough, the Region 10 Opposition Member of Parliament said LBN did more than just acquire a license.
“We secured the license, and the equipment and we also rehabilitated the entire NCN building because it was in a deplorable state, we equipped the entire building, paint it over, new furniture, lights, AC, basically, we rehabilitated the entire building,” he explained.
He said though they were not able to finalise the transfer of the assets, significant progress had been made, and it is now for the PPP/C to play its part in keeping with the agreement it signed in 2012. “You didn’t honour it then, but we started the process by giving the people of Linden the license, giving them monies for them to rehabilitate it into a modern facility and the government was also prepared to give the people of Linden the assets. And it is only prudent that you continue it in good faith,” Figueira said.
