APNU+AFC accuse NCN, Gov’t friendly media of “tampering with ads”

By Jomo Paul

[www.inewsguyana.com] – The APNU+AFC Coalition has levelled serious allegations of advertisement “tampering” against the management of the National Communications Network (NCN) and Guyana Times/Television Guyana (TVG).

APNU+AFC’s Cathy Hughes at a news conference on Friday May 08, pointed out what has been deemed as “glaring instances” whereby advertisements were sent along with specific times for airing and publishing but the ads were not played. According to Hughes, some of the adverts have been deliberately modified to exclude parts of the advertisement where it says “Vote APNU+AFC.”

“What we have observed is that the NCN is selecting which ads they want to play and they certainly do not play it at the times we want to play,” said Hughes, adding that “it is a deliberate strategy” on the part of the management of the media houses.

She pointed out that the behaviour persists despite several meetings and interactions with the management teams of the two media entities.

“We have had several discussions with them, today was the last straw when we had booked two full page ads since April 26 and they do not appear, but the PPP/C has six full page, full colour ads,” Hughes said about Guyana Times.

“Worst yet when we looked at TVG they demanded that we pay in advance and quite often our request for invoices took three and four days to come back to us….the majority of our ads are not being played…if we book ten ads on average maybe one or two are being played,” she stated.

Hughes noted too that the APNU+AFC sternly reject a plan by NCN to broadcast the final rally of the PPP which is slated for Saturday May 9 at Lusignan, East Coast Demerara.

“That is totally unacceptable, there is no way the PPP’s rally can be transmitted live on NCN when taxpayers in this country are paying for operations at NCN…if the PPP rally is being aired the APNU+AFC’s rally has to be aired,” she noted.

When asked whether she believes that the APNU+AFC would pay for its rally to be aired, Hughes said that the coalition would be willing to pay $1.5M.

Meanwhile, when contacted, General Manager of Guyana Times/TVG Daniel Singh told iNews that the media entity has been publishing and airing APNU+AFC advertisements.

“We have been carrying ads for APNU as far as I know on television and newspaper and I believe radio too…we have been carrying all the ads as long as we receive them,” said Singh.

“We have been carrying APNU programmes, we have aired their rallies…if there is a specific incident where an Ad has not been carried then there must have been some explanation,” the General Manager noted.

Additionally, when contacted for a response, Molly Hassan, NCN’s Chief Executive Officer sternly said that “NCN has never tampered nor adjusted any ads received by the APNU.”

She however noted that the company has had cause to hold some of the ads to be reviewed since they were believed to have contained “defamatory content.”

When asked about the plans to air the PPP’s final rally for the election’s season, Hassan said that this was not the case.

“I don’t know where they got that from…there is no broadcast, I have not formally received a response from the PPP,” said Hassan initially.

She then stated that “the engagement is not for a national broadcast” but when asked what it was for, she noted that “they are clients of NCN I can’t really disclose that.”

Subsequently, the Chief Executive Officer added “nothing will be broadcast…we have our regular programme schedule and that will continue.”