The National Media Commission has blocked a directive issued by Communications Minister Ursula Owusu to the Ghana Broadcasting Cooperation to reduce the number of its channels on the Digital Terrestrial Television platform.
The order to the state broadcaster was met with resistance by the cooperation, the minority in parliament and the Media Foundation for West Africa.
The National Media Commission after an examination of the issue brought before it by GBC said in a statement seen by dreamzfmonline.com that “It is the view of the Commission that any action by any entity which culminates into limiting or depriving the media of the use of public resources legitimately allocated to them undermines their capacity to serve the nation as anticipated by the Constitution. The Commission wishes to state clearly that the directive given to GBC and Crystal TV by the Minister for Communications purports to usurp the constitutional mandate and authority of the National Media Commission and same cannot be obliged under our current constitutional dispensation.”
The NMC also clarified that “The Commission wishes to state clearly that the directive given to GBC and Crystal TV by the Minister for Communications purports to usurp the constitutional mandate and authority of the National Media Commission and same cannot be obliged under our current constitutional dispensation.”
The Media Foundation for West Africa had earlier argued that the directive undermines relevant constitutional and regulatory provisions on institutional governance and operational independence of the state broadcaster and media pluralism generally and therefore called on the NMC to dismiss it.
