The more things change….

SOCIAL ACTIVIST MARK BENSCHOP IS AMUSED BY THE ANTICS of the two
political giants of Guyana whom he sees as two sides of the same coin: vindictive, spiteful and
cavalier.
The two parties have traded places between 2015 and 2020. As the major opposition, the Peoples
National Congress (PNC) encouraged radio station owners to ignore paying what it called
exorbitant fees demanded by the statutory Guyana National Broadcasting Authority (GNBA). It
promised to ease their burden when voted into office.
In May 2015 as the leading partner of the six-party A Partnership for National Unity, Alliance
For Change (APNU+AFC) coalition, it won those national and regional polls and like the butler
in the Genesis story of dreams, promptly forgot the broadcasters woes in the 63 months it was in
office.
For Benschop, the PNC and PPP as identical twins wield the proverbial sword of Damocles with
chilling effect against private media owners.
“What is ironic about this is in 2013 when they (APNU+AFC) were in opposition, through Mr.
Harmon they said to all the broadcasters not to pay the $2.5M (annual broadcasting fee) claiming
that it was too high. I agree that it was too high. But when the coalition got into office, guess
what, people continue to pay the $2.5M and even more. Nothing was done about it,” Benschop
said.
Benschop made the observation while hosting one of his regular internet radio programmes. He
is unhappy that the Irfaan Ally administration has politicised and weaponised the GNBA which
should be an independent entity. According to Mr. Benschop, whenever media owners criticise
either the APNU+AFC or PPP/C governments, they use their powers of licensing and
advertisement to inflict punishment on them.

During the David Granger administration’s 63 months in office, Benschop said the state-owned
Department of Public Information (DPI) managed then by AFC’s Mr. Imran Khan, gave his
business a mere three advertisements.
With Mr. Moses Nagamootoo as Prime Minister and doubling as the government’s Information
Minister, Benschop’s firm would get an average of one advertisement about every two years
from DPI.
By comparison, the privately-owned Stabroek News, a relentless critic of the Granger
administration, over the same period, received some $250M from the APNU+AFC government.
In contrast, the PPP/C government, in almost one year since its 2020 re-election, has given no
ads to Benschop’s business.
Attorney at Law and Chief Executive Officer of Hoyte-Blackman television (HBTV), Mr. Nigel
Blackman, echoed similar sentiments about the incumbent and the main opposition
parliamentary party. Blackman stressed while APNU+AFC was in opposition they had
encouraged the broadcasters to eschew payment of the exorbitant fees in keeping with a 2014
favourable ruling for broadcasters by the late Chief Justice, Mr. Ian Chang.
Blackman said when the APNU+AFC was elected in 2015 they pressured and penalised the very
broadcasters to pay those much-criticised fees. According to the media executive, he was
virtually held at ransom to conform, or be denied his radio license.
“What was worse, some of us were threatened to pay and they (APNU+AFC) held some of our
radio licenses. What is funny is that they were the ones who told us not to pay. I was one of them
that was held hostage personally,” Blackman recalled.
As an opposition politician, former Minister of State, Mr. Joseph Harmon was in the vanguard
of broadcasters’ fight against uneconomical licence fees demanded by the PPP/C coalition
government.
But when they were elected in 2015, Benschop and other embattled media owners found Harmon
and the Granger-led APNU+AFC to be a leprechaun.

“My license was taken away from me under the coalition. It was taken away from me (and)
I was given an ultimatum of one month to come up with over US$15,000 (G$3M). I just
have to smile about it,” Benschop noted.