Channel 7 and KREM Television are up in arms over a recent move, forced by Belize Telemedia Limited (BTL), one of Michael Ashcroft’s most lucrative companies, to block their signals in several communities across Belize—what some deem as an assault not just on the television stations, but also on Belizeans who prefer these stations for their people-centered and independent approach to news and information.
The alleged assault began on Friday, August 1, but it was not until Tuesday that the public began to understand why TV “snow” had taken the place of real content.
“What it amounts to is blatant censorship and discrimination,” said KREM TV’s general manager, Mose Hyde, also the host of the KREM WUB Morning Vibes talk show.
Channel 7 director, Jules Vasquez, told Amandala today that when the problems were first reported by cable subscribers late last week, one cable company in Belize City blamed “technical difficulties,” suggesting it was the television station at fault for the content not being available on air to cable viewers.
Detailed information on the issue first came to our news desk on Tuesday, August 5, when Amandala received a forwarded e-mail, “Look what Ashcroft is up to now!” – effectively informing Belizeans that decisions had been taken by Channel Broadcasting Cable (CBC) to block the stations in areas such as Hattieville, Mile 8, and La Democracia.
That night, Channel 7 News carried the story on its newscast, and revealed that as many as eight communities had been chopped off the network.
That’s when the issue reportedly first came to the attention of the Belize Broadcasting Authority, which has called an emergency meeting to look into the matter.
Mose Hyde told Amandala today that he first learned that his station was being blocked outside the City on Tuesday from Jules. Nobody from the cable companies or from BTL ever approached KREM, Hyde said.
Since then, he has spoken with the cable operators, who have informed that BTL wanted KREM to run ads on the station “for free”, in exchange for being carried on CBC’s cable network, while it would have to pay cash for being carried on Baymen’s network—another cable system from which KREM was axed last week.
“At first, I was kind of nonchalant, because I thought that the signal had simply been cut from Dangriga and from San Ignacio in Cayo. I was not aware KREM had also been terminated from 8 Miles, Democracia and from the villages that both places serve. I did not know that they had basically severed all those links, and once I had found out we had been severed from all those links, I was extremely concerned,” said Mose.
People on the airwaves are now calling for a boycott, the talk show host/station manager added.
Out west a cable operation there had to fight to keep Channel 7 on, said Jules, but they insisted that KREM would have to pay.
We are reliably informed from an inside source that the cable provider had claimed that it had already been carrying Channel 7 through an internet streaming service – for which Channel 7 has to pay BTL – and therefore BTL agreed for the service provider to continue carrying 7 there at no cost – but not KREM.
Jules told Amandala this morning that his station has been in constant communication with the cable operators since Friday, after callers complained about not receiving the Friday evening news broadcast and CBC’s owner, Bob Reich, told Channel 7 before he left the country that BTL made it clear to them that BTL did not want to carry those signals on the fiber optic network.
Vasquez told us that as of yesterday afternoon—and only after heavy pressure—7 was reconnected at Hattieville and Mile 8 – where their signals were available to television viewers through open air.
Amandala has been informed that by law, there is a must-carry rule, whereby cable operators must carry channels that viewers could receive otherwise through open air, antenna connections.
The issue has sparked public outcry and outrage among some viewers. Some view the blockage as outright censorship; others as a direct assault upon the Belizean public, not just on the television stations.
But why would Aschroft’s BTL want to assault Belizeans, as some claim? One Ladyville subscriber surmised that the trigger was a people’s victory last Friday when the Belize Bank lost the case with the Central Bank, and the Central Bank made an immediate move to issue an arrest warrant for the Belize Bank’s president, Phil Johnson.
“Two cable service providers have cooperated with BTL’s hostile request,” Mose commented. He said that KREM TV had been received in Dangriga for the past month and a half, in San Ignacio for a month, but other places in Belize District for several years.
The issue of KREM being asked to pay is ludicrous, said Hyde, and it amounts to asking the local networks to pay for the expansion of the cable companies, to pay for HBO, Show Time, etc., he added.
“This argument about us paying is hogwash. The day this thing broke, the boss of CBC…admitted that BTL requested KREM and Channel 7 not be put on,” said Hyde.
Even though BTL has never approached KREM or Channel 7 about the issue, both stations are now being told by the cable companies that BTL’s position is that they would have to pay a fee to BTL to use its cable. No one has been told how many thousands they would have to fork up.
There has never been any talk with the station that they would have to pay to be carried until after the recent controversy broke, said Vasquez, adding that, “The position [now taken that KREM and 7 have to pay] is not only fictitious but patently ridiculous.”
Vasquez insisted that it is “patently ridiculous” to ask local television stations to pay for being carried on the fiber optic network when it is the cable companies that have to pay for more than 90% of the content which comes to them from abroad.
More than that, one cable operator confirmed to us that not only do they, the cable companies, pay a fee for carrying foreign content on BTL’s fiber optic cable, but they also have to pay a subscriber’s fee to foreign agents to broadcast that content here.
The irony, though, is this: At the end of the day, it is each and every cable subscriber who picks up the tab, since these businesses are financed with the monies they earn from selling service to locals.
For BTL to thrive, those voices of KREM and Channel 7 have to be quelled, because they can’t be bought, and cannot be trusted, Jules said.
Just before KREM and 7 were axed off cable, CBC had received approval for a license to carry its service in seven communities: Mile 8, Hattieville, Mahogany Heights, Armenia, St. Margaret’s, Cotton Tree, and Frank’s Eddy. The stations were additionally axed from cable in Dangriga.
Amandala was informed Wednesday morning that Ladyville had also been affected last Friday, as residents there had complained that they were unable to catch the much-anticipated evening news on Channel 7.
The emergence of two major national cable networks, one clearly with a close relationship with Telemedia, should have meant a good thing for cable subscribers. But what has instead erupted in the recent state of affairs hints to a wider power struggle and the quest for controlling not just public monies, but the very minds of Belizeans with foreign content via television programming, thereby distracting them from the issues right at home affecting their daily lives.
Of note is that KREM’s specific niche is providing Afro-centric and indigenous content to viewers, rather than mainstream type broadcast content. Channel 7 has inarguably set itself apart as the leader in television news.
Mose Hyde views the latest moves by Telemedia against KREM and Channel 7 as “…a part of a sustained assault, sustained hostilities which BTL and Michael Ashcroft initiated with the Internet blockage, thereafter a full advertisement boycott. Now they want to exchange ads so we can be on [cable]? They damn well know the only way we will accept ads is if the boycott against KREM and Amandala were to be lifted.”
Tony Leslie, the chairman of the Belize Broadcasting Authority, told Amandala in an interview this morning that the authority should issue a statement after its emergency meeting either Friday or early next week.
We understand that at least one of the TV stations is speaking with Prime Minister Dean Barrow about the matter, since he is the minister in charge of broadcasting in Belize.
Vasquez noted that in May 2007, both KREM and TV 7 were punished by BTL for the stance they took opposing the Vesting Bill, which transferred the business of the once Belizean company, Belize Telecommunications Limited, to a company which in recent years came under the consolidated control of British tycoon, Michael Ashcroft. Since then Telemedia executed the full buy-out of Channel 7’s rival, Channel 5.
Around the same time of the advertisement boycott against KREM and 7, BTL went a step further to block KREM’s streaming service off the Internet without notice. Telemedia justified its actions by claiming that KREM could no longer benefit from the service unless it negotiated a contract with BTL. Now comes the cable TV saga.
At least three cable companies have made statements addressing the current controversy.
On Tuesday, Centaur Communications, the cable company of PUP leader, Johnny Briceño, issued a release essentially trying to distance itself from the latest ordeals. Centaur said that it transmits TV 7 in Ladyville and Corozal, but not in Orange Walk, “as exclusive rights were given to Northern Cable.”
It added that KREM TV has been transmitted in Ladyville since August 2007, and is still being transmitted there.
Cayo Cable Vision and its head office, Baymen Cable, told Amandala on record this morning, that they “…have entered into a commercial agreement with BTL, to carry our signal to and from Belize City, via their fiber network. It has been our understanding from the onset that any media house that was not already being carried on our network would have to enter into a rental agreement with BTL in order to be carried nationwide on their fiber. It is my understanding that most media houses have already done so.” That statement came to Amandala this morning from owner, Pete Lizarraga.
As for CBC, the company says it, “will continue to air the local television stations free of cost in those areas where they were being received before through open air; that is, with the use of an antenna.”
The August 6 statement added that, “…where local channels are not available by antenna the local television stations will need to make arrangements with Belize Telemedia Limited to be carried on its fiber optic network.”
Telemedia subsidiary, Channel 5, reported last night that BTL had issued a statement, claiming that because of the increased opportunity provided by the expansion of its fiber optic network, the television stations now have potential to earn more advertising revenues, and so should discuss new commercial terms with Telemedia to receive the benefits of that coverage.