From the beginning of this month, Nigerian radio stations have had to deal with a new directive from the National Broadcasting Commission. The NBC ordered that local radio and televisions stations couldn't relay foreign news broadcasts live. What this mea
But this does not mean that Nigerians are being denied total access to the BBC's programmes. After all, they can still listen to the programmes through the trusted short wave radio. The one drawback, though, is that reception on short wave is not too clear. It is for this reason that the BBC entered into arrangements with many radio stations in Africa for them to relay its programmes live on the clearer FM wavelength.
The NBC says that its move is necessary because "apart from the perspectives they convey, it is a professional aberration for a station to relay any news content over which it has no editorial control." The NBC went on to argue that such broadcasts posed a danger to national security and warned that stations that stepped out of line would face punishment, which was not specified.
The NBC's move has received mix reactions in Nigeria. The stations that are affected have not taken kindly to the ban. Human rights activists, too, argue against the NBC's action. "This is certainly a breach of Nigeria's constitutional and international obligation to protect freedom to obtain information across borders and without interference," noted Jumoke Soares, a human rights activist.
Others, though, see the move in a different light. Political analyst Uche Obidike believes that the NBC has taken the right step. "I think it's only proper, because I doubt if there are any local radio stations in Britain that provide live relays of news broadcast by Nigerian stations," he argued.
So what does all this portend? The way I see it, the NBC's action is in line with the battles countries in the South have been waging against cultural and media imperialism.
Although these two issues dominated the headlines in the 1970s, they have not completely gone away. They were at the heart of the New World Information and Communications Order that was aimed at redressing the balance of the global flow of information. The NWICO debate was primarily aimed at stopping the one-way flow of information from North to South.
Cultural imperialism is to do with the continued domination of the South by countries of the North. It is an extension of classical imperialism, but this has more to do with hegemony rather than overt domination. Whereas in the past it was a case of the metropolitan nations having direct political and economic control of countries in the developing world, this control is now exercised through the subtle nature of the communications media.
The control of the communications media is part of a general move by core countries - that is, those in the industrialised North - to dominate in the areas of global politics and economics. This domination has led to a dependency syndrome, which has greatly impaired the development of countries in the periphery - that is, those in the developing South. This is a form of neo-colonialism that is being carried out through the global political and economic systems.
Cultural imperialism is spearheaded by the US, which has made the free flow of information the linchpin of its foreign policy - thus confirming its hegemonic intentions on the cultural front. The Americans dominate in the production of cultural goods, which are exported worldwide. But because the US produces so many films and television programmes - not to mention records - it is inevitable that this dominance would arise.
In order to push American culture further, US television production companies sell their programmes to foreign broadcasters cheaply. They can afford to do so because the American market is huge enough to provide profits for US producers. It is quite clear that this arrangement makes it easier for the US to maintain its dominance in the area of cultural products.
Unlike cultural imperialism, media imperialism has to do more with media control and ownership. Media imperialism goes further than cultural imperialism in that all aspects of production and dissemination are concentrated in the hands of the few multi-national corporations - thus creating imbalances in world media.
This dominance is maintained through international television markets. There, the big players in the business sell their products to all and sundry and they are willing to reduce their prices drastically to market their products to television stations in developing countries. The situation is compounded for these stations because the developing country price for one episode of an American show is far cheaper to buy than to have the programme produced locally. This aids cultural imperialism.
With their technological and financial clout, it is easier for Western media organisations to run multi-national media and communications companies that operate across national boundaries. This dominance has allowed Northern media organisations to frame and foreground media coverage of the South that tend to be, in the eyes of countries in the periphery, negative.
Any way, I'm just theorising. The Nigerian government might have other reasons - apart from national security and "editorial control" - for stopping live foreign news broadcasts on local radio stations. One would hope that the move does not have anything to do with censorship or a clamp down on the Nigerian media.
