Dear Editor,
Guyana is unique, a really strange country, as one columnist likes to put it we are Blighted Guyana (BG). The State now has three frequencies in Georgetown, Guyana NCN (Channel 11), the Learning Channel (Cable 80) and now Chinese state TV CCTV/NCN on Channel 27/Cable 78. The National Frequency Management Unit (NFMU) is still to reveal who has been allocated what frequencies in Guyana.
At the end of 2011, the Chinese Embassy and the State-owned and controlled media NCN inked a deal for a 24-hour CCTV broadcast. This is although the Guyana Government had given an undertaking that no new licence would be issued. The Government of Guyana gave China a 24-hour channel on Guyana’s “limited electro-magnetic spectrum” ahead of its own and CARICOM Citizens under the Caricom Single Market and Economy mechanism. Note carefully what the then CEO of NCN said about the agreement “NCN agreed that once the equipment is provided, and the Government of Guyana grants a licence for broadcast we will manage the station”. Should I repeat what the CEO said “and the Government of Guyana grants a licence”.
It is now clear that Channel 27/Cable 78 has been operating, bringing “Chinese English language programming” to Guyana through the auspices of the Government of Guyana. Sovereignty and Reciprocity issues aside, the emergence of the Chinese Content/State Carrier operation points to the dilemma the Guyana Government faces in Linden and elsewhere. It also reinforces the belief that the control of the carrier frequencies to ensure that only approved content goes out to the People of Beautiful Guyana is the tacit policy with regard to spectrum management. Only those whom the Government of Guyana (GOG) favours shall be granted favours.
The fact that Guyana has Chinese Content TV on a frequency paid for and essentially operated by a foreign government through a State to State mechanism ought to raise eyebrows in any normal sovereign democratic Nation State. But is Guyana such a State or are we in a State, quite a State?
Yours faithfully,
Enrico Woolford
