Kudos, Knocks As NBC Clocks 20

THE National Broadcasting Commission (NBC), the government regulatory agency that superintends over the nation’s airwaves as it concerns broadcasting clocks 20 this month. The legal framework that gave birth to the agency was promulgated on August 24, 1992 by the then Military President Ibrahim Badamos Babangida.

Tagged: National Broadcasting Commission Act No. 38 of 1992, its enactment heralded the deregulation of the broadcasting industry which had hitherto been monopolized by the governments, at federal, regional, and later, state levels.

At the dawn of civil rule in 1999, the extant law underwent certain amendment and this was captured as National Broadcasting Commission (Amendment) Act NO.55 of 1999, endorsed on May 26, 1999 by the then Head of State, General Abdulsalam Abdubakar.

Apart from advising the Federal Government generally on the implementation of the National Mass Communication Policy with particular reference to broadcasting, the functions of the commission, principally, include: receiving, processing and considering applications for the establishment, ownership or operation of radio and television stations, including cable television services, direct satellite broadcast and any other medium of broadcasting.

Largely, the commission scores high point in the discharge of its functions as it relates to overall regulating and controlling of the broadcast industry in the last 20 years of existence.

However, what critics find repugnant is the vesting of the power to grant radio and TV licences in the President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces as NBC serves, ordinarily, as channel through which applications for licences are recommended.

Even with this constraint, it is on record that the commission has facilitated the existence and operation of more than 300 radio and TV stations. Information from the NBC indicates that, today, there are 305 functional broadcast stations in Nigeria. Indeed, from first set of 14 TV and 13 Multi-channel, Multi-point Distribution System (MMDS) licences issued in 1992, the figure has grown to 122 television; 177 radio stations; 24 MMDS and 12 Direct-to-Home licences issued so far.

To the commission’s pioneer Director General, Dr. Tom Adaba, “NBC has done very well within these 20 years, going from 24 stations in 1992 to over 300 stations today. This is in itself a big accomplishment.”

Apart from the physical presence of these stations, Dr. Adaba also scored the agency high in the area of its regulatory function. “NBC has not done badly at all. Ditto the introduction of digital broadcasting, which shows that broadcasting in Nigeria is following the world trend. I think they are doing a very good job and the area I still see there is a lot of work to be done is the issue of publicity and mobilisation of the people about digitisation.

“Take for example, with the MPEG4 that is being introduced, a station, after the digital migration, will be able to take as many as 12 to 15 channels! Meaning what was one channel before, would accommodate 12 to 15 channels! The question is, what are you going to showcase in those channels? The issue of content becomes paramount, and to me, it will require a great deal of campaign to be able to sensitise both the operators and the general public for them to prepare well for this challenge. I think NBC still needs to do great work on this. But by and large, NBC has done a very good job in the last 20 years.”

Now that the federal government has released the White Paper on the report of the Presidential Advisory Committee on Digitisation with a new switchover date of January 1, 2015, the veteran broadcaster would like the commission to hit the ground and start running. “We can’t afford to miss this second chance. We have wasted a lot of time, it is better we got our act together and mobilise Nigerians if the new deadline of January 1, 2015 would be met,” he said.

Adaba also believed in the on-going campaign for the review of the NBC Act, saying that the amendment has become desirable in view of new trends and development in the broadcasting industry globally.

Media critic and Managing Director/Editor-in-Chief of Media Review, Mr. Lanre Idowu, also scored the agency high in area of serving as a credible monitor, promoting the quest for sanity on the airwaves. Idowu however canvassed more autonomy for the agency for it to bark and bite appropriately in the effort to raise the bar for swifter response to ethical and regulatory infractions.

“The good work that the NBC has done in the area of providing guidelines for community broadcasting has remained mere intentions because it lacks the policy muscle to execute without awaiting the approval of government,” Idowu reasoned. He said further that, “at a time that the country is talking of amending the Constitution, the time has come for an amendment that allows a levy on radio and television receivers to be collected by the NBC as part of the move to build a fairly independent regulatory body that is not beholden to the government of the day.”

The grouse of the Journalism teacher at the Lagos State University, Mr. Tunde Akanni with the NBC is that it has never distinguished itself. “Ironically, it has been led by distinguished persons like erudite Tom Adaba, and even the incumbent, Yomi Bolarinwa, a most versatile professional.”

Statutorily, Akanni insisted that the agency is handcuffed. “It can set standard but cannot conclude the same process it is mandated to oversee. I mean the licensing of broadcast stations. Why won’t NBC be given same measure of power as Nigerian Communication Commission NCC?

“Good news however is that technology is smarter than the mischievous law and policy makers we are unlucky to have here. They only need to find out how powerless they are now with the inception of new media technology. In Brazil today, several radio stations simply choose to broadcast from Net without bothering to seek any licence from government. Can you imagine any government toying with the idea of proscribing any newspaper like Abacha did years back? One certain thing is that Orosanye or no Orosanye, NBC has limited time to leave given the weakening effect technology keeps impacting on it,” Akanni declared

The impact of technology on broadcasting especially in the post NBC at 20 era is the kernel of the submission of Mr. Bayo Atoyebi, Executive Secretary, Nigerian Press Council (NPC), who had previously served as Acting Director General of the commission.

“The convergence of regulation is world-wide and among the best practices is that at the UK’s Office of Communications (Offcom). Here, of its six functions, four relates to broadcasting while two concerns telephony. This perhaps is a strong pointer that broadcasting may not be subsumed or submerged into telephony when the regulators have to converge.
Of critical note, is the world wide transition from analogue to digital whose final switch-off, as set by ITU is June 17, 2015.

“Already, Nigeria has lagged  behind its national 2012 deadline, therefore, critical rapidity needs be injected into implementation phases. For now Television is of utmost concerns, where challenges of set top boxes deserves most critical governmental attention.

“Nevertheless, unless harmony is engendered and unanimity of broadcast formats are established, the respite radio broadcast enjoys from digital transition, for the immediate future could evolve into conflicting DAB/DRM and etc platforms that may shortchange radio audience in our nation. This should take into long term cognisance the broadcast formats of neighbour nations surrounding Nigeria.”
Another issue of concern raised by Atoyebi is the establishment of community radio in the country. He submitted: “The universally acclaimed third tier of radio broadcasting — community radio is  a tier that Nigeria is lagging behind in its desirous development. Radio for the community; owned by the categories of communities and run or managed by the community deserves more positive impetuses.”

Broadcasting, as a calling, he insisted, “deserves to have a conclave of professional peers : a Nigerian Society of Broadcasters for want of a better name. This kind of body, available but not orgsnised, should serve as independent restraining and advisory body of peers that can impinge on standards that are suffering grave on-air deficit by each day.”

The issue of the independence of the regulatory agency did not escape Atoyebi’s attention, cautioning that, “unless the management of broadcasting, in both government owned or the privately owned is encapsulated with professional operational independence, the current order of the owner, either government or the individual especially politicians, dictating the tune will continue to undermine freedom of expression and the integrity of broadcasting.

“In the same vein, current suggestions to wean broadcasting control off the Executive arm of government to the Legislative arm may not be far sighted. For, even as today many a legislator are distinguished owners of broadcasting and we may be robbing one executive Paul to pay a legislative Peter. Here is wishing for a professional NBC many scores of years of affective regulation in the service of our nation.”

Another former DG of the commission, Dr. Silas Babayiya Yisa provided an insight into the inconclusiveness of the merger exercise between the NBC and the Nigerian Communication Commission (NCC) that was initiated in 2006 with a warning that certain pitfall should be avoided now that the issue has surfaced again in the report submitted recently by the Orosanye panel.

“With regards to planned merger of NBC with NCC, or if I may put it correctly, absorption of NBC into NCC, in 2006, the NBC under my leadership did not oppose the idea, but we were not comfortable with way and manner which the then Minister of Information went about it.

“The whole process was in a rush and suspicious with verbal instructions to dismantle all NBC structures and disengage the staff. The then Minister told me he wanted only a maximum of 100 staff out of 600+ hard working people spread all over the federation. I needed to buy time in order to secure the jobs and livelihood of the staff.  Bye and large, I think the whole planned merger failed then because things were not well thought out.

“Also, principal drivers behind the merger then were licencees who had always seen the NBC as, if I may put it, a stumbling block to their lust for lawlessness, like refusal to pay licence fees and so on.”

He is optimistic that the merger process this time around may yield positive result with a far reaching effect on the functionality of the NBC in years to come. “I am sure that this time around the committee is much more open and devoid of personal and selfish interest and probably much more  detailed within a much wider scope of the whole exercise. I am sure that committee this time around, will adopt a more holistic approach in a wider context of repositioning of government apparatus for effective service delivery.”

Historically, broadcasting began in Nigeria 77 years ago. It started with radio in 1935 from empire service to re-diffusion service; and later radio Nigeria. Television came in 1959. Western Nigeria Broadcasting Service (WWBS) was the first regional broadcasting service. Eastern Nigeria Broadcasting Service (ENBS) followed in 1960. Northern Nigeria (BCNN) in 1962.

Prof. Sam Oyovbare was the Minister of Information at the birth of NBC in 1992; Dr. Tom Adaba as pioneer DG and serving on a 10-man board headed Mr. Peter Enahoro with Bright Igbako as Secretary to the Commission.

As first of its kind in the history of Africa, NBC task at inception was to set up an administrative structure, the nucleus of which was the red bricks building at Tafawa Balewa Square (TBS), in Lagos. The Commission went for young people who could grow and grow with the Commission and till date, its leadership has always been from within. Headquarters was moved from Lagos to Abuja in 1998, while the second Director General, Mallam Nasir Danladi Bako, was appointed in July 1999. He resigned his appointment in November 2002 and Dr. Silas Babajiya Yisa took over as the third DG until August 2006 when Mr. Bayo Atoyebi replaced him in an acting capacity.

The present DG, engineer Yomi Bolarinwa, a fellow of the Nigerian Society of Engineers was appointed in 2007 on acting capacity, but later confirmed by the late President Yar’adua on February 17, 2009.

The Commission is made up of five directorates: office of the Secretary and Legal Adviser to the Commission; Broadcast Content and Enforcement; Broadcast Policy and Research; Engineering Technology; and Management Services. The department of Public Affairs and Internal Audit are under the Office of the Director General. In addition, there are ten Zonal Offices and 17 state offices.

AFRICAST, the summit of African broadcasters’ biennial conference initiated by the commission made its debut in 1996.

It has become a platform that brings broadcasters, manufacturers of broadcasting equipment, academics, scholars, students of broadcasting and mass communication together on every two years. The ninth edition of the programme is due for October, this year.

The NBC News is the publication of the Commission (a quarterly magazine). It keeps the reader abreast of what is happening in the broadcast industry.

There is also the regulator, which is the in-house journal for staff, as platform to express and discuss professional and personal issues among one another.

Through its function of undertaking research and development in the broadcast industry, the commission is proud to announce that television broadcast now reach more than 24million house-holds nationwide.

And as the driver of the Nigeria’s march to digitization, the NBC will be deriving inspiration from countries that have completed the process with minimal hitches, especially, the United States of America that finalized its switchover on June 12, 2009.

With the DIGITEAM, which is being put together to work on the transition programme as approved by the government white paper, and the fact that, as far back as 2006, all cable licensees, Direct-to-Home — the Satellite service providers — have gone digital, the commission is optimistic that the digital race to the new deadline of January 1, 2015 is most assured.

And the 20th anniversary on August 24, 2012 will be marked with the launch of the fifth edition of the Nigeria Broadcasting Code, that was finalized at the Code Review Retreat held between September 5 and 8, 2011 in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State.

Source: The Guardian.