The National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) on Tuesday said Channels Television had apologised over its infraction of the broadcasting code.
NBC\u2019s Director of Public Affairs, Mrs Franca Aiyetan, said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), on Tuesday in Abuja.
Aiyetan explained that the commission\u2019s letter to the TV station was a regulatory instrument to check the excesses of the station called \u201cthe bridge letter \u201c.
She said that the intent of the letter was neither to close down nor sanction the station, rather it was\u00a0meant to draw\u00a0the station\u2019s attention to its breach of the broadcasting code, adding that \u201cthe station has accordingly apologised\u2019\u2019.
According to her, the letter is asking Channels TV to explain why it gave credence to an organisation that was already proscribed by the\u00a0Federal Government.
\u201cIt was actually not for public consumption, it was not a press release. It was a regulatory instrument to check the excesses of the station.
\u201cIt is a station that won an award but we say in this particular situation, you did not handle it professionally.
\u201cIt is possible to bridge the public peace and that was what the letter conveyed to Channels TV, to which the TV station has responded, saying we apologise, we did wrong.
\u201cWhen the\u00a0media\u00a0started asking me about Channels TV, I had to go and find out what letter we had issued out because if it is a press release or something that is for public consumption it will come to the Public Affairs Department of NBC.
\u201cAnd I will be able to communicate to the\u00a0media\u00a0about it but this letter that went to Channels TV is our way of regulating the broadcasting industry.
\u201cIt is called a bridge letter to the station to say in this particular programme you did not act professionally; you did not do it in line with the provision of the Nigeria Broadcasting Code.\u201d
The director further explained that the particular programme in reference was an interview of somebody who was representing an organisation that was already proscribed by the\u00a0Federal Government.
She said that in the exercise of its power as the regulatory body, NBC wrote a letter asking Channels TV to explain why it gave credence to the spokesman of the proscribed organisation.
\u201cThe spokesman made lots of allusion that were not true, that are inciting and inimical to the peace of the society that could cause unrest.
\u201cThe NBC now said because of that this bridge attracts a shut down or a fine of N5 million; but the pay line was that they were advised to discontinue the programme.
\u201cBecause when a station interviews live, the keep repeating it for maybe 24 hours before that kind of news will be dropped.
\u201cAnd when I followed up on Monday April 26, I discovered that the monitoring department that had written the letter had also received an apology letter from the Channels TV to say okay, we have received your letter and see where we went wrong, we are sorry.
\u201cSo it is now left for NBC to say this station has responded or reacted this way. The letter was neither meant to shut down the station nor sanction it. Rather, it is drawing their attention to what they have done.\u201d
Aiyetan said that the station was also free to write NBC back to say \u201cwe stand on what we have done because in our own professional analysis of what we have done we think we are right.\u2019\u2019
\u201cMay be NBC misinterpreted our intention. And when we have a situation like that, we invite the station to sit down on dialogue table and understand where they are coming from.
\u201cAnd then we will also explain to say this is what you intend to do but for those receiving the signals, this is what it connotes, this is what the gravity of what you have done to the country.\u201d
According to her, when a particular programme in a bid to pursue a particular trending issue begins to threaten the security and peace of the nation, then you check yourself.
\u201cBecause broadcasting is not self-serving; it is for the society. So everything you do must be to the common good of the people and it must also hold the people accountable.\u201d (NAN)
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The National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) on Tuesday said Channels Television had apologised over its infraction of the broadcasting code. NBC\u2019s Director of Public Affairs, Mrs Franca Aiyetan, said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), on Tuesday in Abuja. Aiyetan explained that the commission\u2019s letter to the TV station was a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":33065,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[2207,3310,723],"class_list":["post-33064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-apology","tag-channels","tag-nbc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33064\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}