The Tribune

By EARYEL BOWLEG

Tribune Staff Reporter

ebowleg@tribunemedia.net

THE Broadcasting Corporation of The Bahamas has denied allegations it had an unfair policy of refusing advertisements from the Progressive Liberal Party before the general election.

The concerns were raised in a report released on the weekend by the Commonwealth Observer Group regarding their observations of the recent election.

In its report, the COG highlighted the concern that the national broadcaster ZNS “did not provide equitable access and/or balanced coverage of the activities of the contending political parties and candidates.”

“This resulted in citizens being deprived of their right to receive balanced information about the election and candidates,” the COG noted.

The report mentioned the then main opposition political party, the PLP, claimed the government broadcaster refused to take its adverts due to “an alleged disputed debt from the last election, even though it offered to pay upfront and clear the debt”.

The COG added: “We were not able to determine the veracity of this allegation, but we found it troubling.”

 In a rebuttal, the “outgoing” BCB board said it “categorically denies and refutes the allegation that it deliberately and unfairly adopted a policy of refusing to accept advertisements from the Progressive Liberal Party (PLP).”

 The BCB argued: “At no time was the corporation politically motivated in dealing with the repayment of debts owed to it by the political parties. The decisions made by the corporation were based entirely on financial considerations and pursued on the basis of fairness.

 “The corporation finds it to be disturbing and unacceptable that the observers should have, without first reaching out to the corporation, utter such disparaging and damaging allegations, and then, astonishingly, to state ‘that it was not possible to determine the veracity of such allegations’ - this cannot be regarded as being balanced or fair.”

 The release claimed both the Free National Movement and PLP owed “substantial sums of money” dating back to the 2017 general election.

 “In order to ensure its continued financial sustainability, the corporation had implemented, amongst other measures, a vigorous and concerted effort to collect substantial outstanding receivables,” the release said.

 It was explained that a decision was made by the board several months ago, before the election was called, that “no new advertisements—whether paid in advance or not—would be aired for any political party until they first settled their outstanding debts.”

 The release explained this was communicated to the political parties. While both major parties expressed their displeasure, prior to the election being called the then governing party paid off its debt while the PLP made only one small payment towards reducing its debt of well over $100,000, the BCB said.

 “On the election being called, the PLP offered to make a payment of $75,000 towards repayment of its outstanding debt which would have left almost the same amount owing and which it offered to pay over time,” BCB noted. “The PLP was informed that, in view of the fact that the FNM had paid off its debt as a precondition to new advertisements being accepted, the corporation could not, in fairness, accept the offer being made. In order to try to assist and accommodate the PLP, it was agreed that a portion of the debt, which it disputed, would be put aside to be dealt with at a future date thereby reducing the amount of debt to be paid off as a precondition to accepting new advertisements.

 “The reduced debt still amounted to over $100,000. The PLP then again offered to pay $75,000 with the balance to be repaid over time which, again, the corporation was unable, in the interest of fairness, to accept. It should be pointed out that, notwithstanding that the FNM had indicated its desire to take most, if not all, of the advertising slots during the election period, the corporation ensured that at least one-third of the slots were reserved for the PLP on the basis that it would settle its indebtedness. The corporation made an offer to the PLP that it would accept the sum of $75,000 with the balance—approximately $37,000— being divided by the number of slots it wished to take, and the resulting amount to be paid at the same time as payment for each advertisement, so that, on payment of the last slot, the entire debt would end up being repaid. The corporation was subsequently informed that the PLP would not be advertising with ZNS during the remaining election period.”

 BCB also stated that the corporation has throughout the recent election period “pursued a policy of fairness and balance.”

 In response to the BCB, PLP chairman Fred Mitchell said: “The persons at ZNS responsible for the unauthorised response to the scathing critique delivered by the international observer group on the September 16, 2021 general elections must cease and desist any representation on behalf of the Bahamas Broadcasting Corporation (BCB) as they have no standing to do so.”