Yusuf Bello| The Board of the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) on Thursday rejected the amendments to the sixth edition of the Nigeria Broadcasting Code unveiled by the Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, on Tuesday last week.
The Chairman of the Board, Ikra Bilbis, who made the position of the commission public while addressing a news conference in Abuja, said the board came to its decision after consultations with stakeholders, activists and legal practitioners.
According to Bilbis, the management of the commission did not undertake a proper consultation before making the amendments to the code, which he said, were capable of destroying investments in the nation’s broadcast sector.
“As a board, we have received and taken our time to compile the responses of numerous stakeholders which include our Nobel Laureate, activists, legal practitioners, broadcasters, investors, Broadcasting Organisations of Nigeria (BON), content creators, copyright experts, and professional organisations.
“Most of them have adduced reasonable reasons against the proposed amendment,” said Bilbis who is a former Minister of State for Information.
Bilbis noted that some members of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) had made observations to the minister at a meeting about the divisive broadcasts engaged in by some broadcast media before, during, and after the elections.
He recalled that President Muhammadu Buhari had also called for the need to strengthen the operations of the NBC to avert a reoccurrence.
The NBC board chairman, however, stressed that the noble observation of the President was misunderstood by the minister.
“The board of the NBC wishes to make it quite clear that as long as it is in place, the only NB Code that we recognise and which we shall work within the setting of operating policies and standards for the NBC is the 6th edition of the NB Code which was launched in 2019 in Kano.
”Another purported review has no board endorsement,” he stated.
Cover Photo: NBC Board Chairman, Ikra Bilbis, addressing a news conference in Abuja on August 13, 2020.
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