Efem Nkanga
16 July 2008
Lagos — Africa Independent Television, AIT, a subsidiary of Daar Communications is set to come up with a multi channel Pay TV platform that will revolutionalise broadcasting in Nigeria.
Chairman of Daar Communications, Chief Aleogho Raymond Dokpesi, who made this known in Lagos, he said Daar was already in the process of upgrading its facilities in each station across the country from analogue to full digital platform.
Dokpesi, who decried the fact that Nigeria was behind South Africa despite the fact that it will celebrate 50 years of broadcasting next year, emphasised that Nigeria needs to start playing its leadership role in the continent by lifting up the standard of its broadcasting.
He added that Daar will soon set up a film village in Lagos to undertake the production of not only movies for sale but also for the consumption of Nigerians. He added that Daar was poised to lift up the standard of TV broadcasting in the nation to enviable heights globally.
He disclosed that AIT was commencing the pay TV broadcasting with 40 channels and will transmit on high definition. The broadcast, according to him, will be a new and totally different pedestal that Nigerians have never seen before.
The studios for the broadcast are large studios, nine meters high. Work is still ongoing at feverish speed as digitalized news rooms are also being built to launch the digitalised station of the future.
Dokpesi who stated that the Abuja studio was already 100 per cent digital, with broadcast to Europe, Asia etc across the whole continent of Africa, however stated that the Lagos studio was just 60% digitalized. "For the multi-channel, we are looking at the test transmission on August 1, this year and the commercial transmission on September 1, and every item we need is already on the ground.
"We are starting with 40 channels. It is the first time in Africa that you will see transmission at this level in high definition. Viewers will see broadcasting at a new level.We are engaging more hands, engaging in training and exposing people to new technologies.
"We are going from the present eight stations to 24 stations. That means we have 16 new stations coming up. Our Abuja station is already 100 percent digital while the Lagos station is about 60 percent digital and is being upgraded. We are running out feed to Asia, Europe, USA and all of Africa," he stated.
Dopkesi who explained some of the challenges of moving from an analogue platform to a digital platform stated that to change platform from analogue to digital, things have to change. One of it is human man power.
This, according to him, means that the entire orientation will change. People on the job will be exposed to new technology, but new technology according to him does not necessarily translate to acquiring more manpower.
The reverse is actually the case because new technology reduces manpower as technology takes over. He gave an example of programme ingestion in the past when 8 programmers under the analogue system were needed, but the onset of the digital platform has drastically reduced this need, ensuring only one or two programmers is sufficient to do the task as the new technology takes over most of the functions that the programmers would have done automatically.
Dopkesi reiterated that training and retraining will be emphasized to get the best out of the youthful members of staff who are technologically inclined. "We will send about 25 people to BOP TV in the UK for training for between three and six months.
There are two institutions for training in this industry in Nigeria. They are the TV College in Jos and the FRCN Training School in Lagos.
Industry operators will have to come together to contribute to the upgrading of these institutions. This will be much cheaper and more effective than having everybody setting up his own training institution. We can bring in people from abroad to assist in the training".
He also predited that the broadcast industry will witness more mergers and acquisitions as more operators embrace technology to put them ahead. He also added that Daar will place a lot of emphasis on entertainment.
"You will see movies from Hollywood, Nollywood and Bollywood. We are also looking at children and teens. We will have quality content that will appeal them. all the 32 foreign channels that we are bringing are highly rated. We will also be strong on sports and news. We have been acquiring a lot of sporting rights. We have a lot of foreign documentaries and we are trying to build up a lot of documentaries on Nigeria and West-Africa, some of them are historical documentaries," he stated.
Dokpesi who also disclosed that the recent initial public offering IPO by Daar in February was over 100% subscribed, stated that the proceeds from the offering will help Daar enhance and consolidate on what it has done already to digitalise broadcasting. He stated that the air wazes belong to Nigerians and that Daar and AIT was just holding it in trust for Nigerians.
He also added that the delay in of the result of the IPO had to do with the SEC guidelines.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2008 This Day. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
