Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) Director General, Prof. Amin Alhassan, has defended the national broadcaster against public criticism following claims that they received $3 million to cover the 2023 African Games.
Prof. Alhassan addressed the allegations made by the Minister of Youth and Sports, Mustapha Ussif, during a Public Accounts Committee (PAC) hearing on Monday, August 19, 2024, on Uniq FM.
The minister claimed that the government had paid GBC more than $3 million to serve as the official broadcaster of the African Games.
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Q: First of all, Let’s have a general overview of what transpired at the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) in terms of this issue.
GBC DG: Well, I think yesterday I was one of those who were shocked to learn that the minister of youth and sports said that they have paid GBC in excess of three million US dollars and I want to assure every Ghanaian in the public that GBC’s total benefit from the African games was 105,000 US dollars equivalent.
Nothing more was paid as a benefit to GBC and that payment of 105,000 US dollars was as support for the fact that we dedicated an entire channel 24 hours, we suspended normal programming for GTV Sports Plus and we dedicated it to the African games and for our role as the official broadcaster.
That is what the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation was paid and not in excess of three million US dollars.
Q: Okay specifically how do we break down what this money was used for?
GBC DG: When you suspend a channel’s normal programming there’s an opportunity cost so it’s used to offset the cost of the channel.
Not doing regular programming so there’s a loss of business so it’s important to point out that when you take an entire channel 24 hours for two weeks it comes at a cost and that was what the money was for. So it was for our operations. It was for our revenue.105,000 US dollars and not in excess of three million US dollars.
Q: Was that enough to actually cover what was provided was that enough to actually cover everything about coverage of the All African Games?
GBC DG: GBC did not go into the All African games as a business. Actually, we went in there as the national broadcaster and what was paid to GBC wasn’t exactly computed as the cost of doing business. It was support to GBC and I should explain to you that the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation was invited to the table less than one month to the games.
To help with the production we made it very clear that there was not enough time for GBC to procure the necessary equipment so we’re okay as an official broadcaster but definitely we needed a technical production team and GBC did not have the equipment to do that.
Now I should also make it very clear to you that as the official broadcaster GBC was supposed to supervise the technical team the technical production was our source and the technical production team that came in to do the broadcast GBC supervised the work and reported to the ministry of youth and sports that work was executed and their payments were due.
Now these payments were made through GBC and paid straight to the service providers they were not paid for GBC’s benefit.
As an official broadcaster, we can confirm that work has been done and these payments were made to these companies and they are not GBC.
Q: Who paid the $105,000 to GBC?
GBC DG: The Ministry of Youth and Sports I said. We have received payment to the tune of 105,000 US dollars from the Ministry of Youth and Sports.
Q: So now that this letter has gone to PAC, what are your expectations?
GBC DG: Well we are setting the record straight there are two questions that have risen. First of all the idea that GBC has received money in excess of three million US dollars we have stated clearly we have received to our direct benefit as a corporation 105,000 US dollars.
Q: Do we have documents to actually prove all of this?
GBC DG: Of course. you cannot transfer 3m and something million dollars without evidence and you must also show who the transfer is in favour of.
When you transfer money, for example, it’s not new we have gone to the government in the past to get money to pay for sports rights sometimes a million dollars sometimes two million dollars the money is paid for the benefit of GBC but to a third party not to GBC so we don’t take the money so we facilitate the payment so in this particular games yes monies were transferred to be paid to third parties and the list and the payment schedule was provided by the ministry of youth and sports and not GBC but as official broadcaster we had to confirm that they have indeed done the work and we did just that.
Now the payment to our benefit we have of up to 105,000 US dollars the payment with the benefit of third parties is also we have the records to show so we don’t have a problem showing with documents and evidence about payments and transfers.
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