COMPARATIVE STUDY ON THE PERFORMANCES OF GOVERNMENT OWNED AND PRIVATELY OWNED MEDIA ORGANIZATION

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1       Background
of the Study  

The
role of the broadcasters and the broadcast media as agents of rural and
national development, especially at the information dissemination level is now
generally recognized and accepted by experts and policy makers. What seems
quite unresolved in many developing countries is how best to utilize the
potentials of the broadcasters and their media to achieve developmental
objectives (Nwosu, 1990:119). In Nigeria, there are three main types of media
ownership namely; government ownership, private ownership and partnership. In
the case of government ownership, the government establishes controls and
finances the media outfit, private ownership is when an individual or a group
of persons establish, control and finance the media outfit in partnership both
the government and private individuals are into some sort of co-ownership regarding
the establishment, financing and controlling of the media house. 

There
is a symbiotic relationship between the media and the society. It is in the
interest of the society to have strong and robust mass media as it is in the
best interest of the media to uphold the values and protect the interest of the
society from which they derive their impulse, support and patronage. No media
institution can survive if it is perceived to be working against its own
society (Onukaba 2005:3).

It
is the duty of any media institution to keep the public aware of what is going
on around them by providing accurate, factual and timely information at all
times. It is also the duty of the media to warn and alert the public about
impending dangers to interpret events or provide information needed by the
public to make every day decision that will make them participate actively in
the political, economic and social activities of a community and to assist the
public in determining current trends. 

Media
institutions are also expected to use their products to educate, entertain,
modify public opinions, reinforce attitudes and set agenda for the society. In
many societies, people depend on the media to know where to find jobs, where to
shop, where to eat, seat out, who to note for etc it is therefore, safe to say
that the influence of the media extends to every aspect of human life and
society. 

But
for media institutions to be able to play these roles effectively, they are
expected to uphold the values of objectivity, fairness, justice, accuracy,
balance, moderation and decency. The reason governments have often given for
their involvement in the media is that the private ones cannot be trusted to
faithfully uphold these values of the profession. They accuse them of fostering
unrealistic expectations among the populace, heightening anxieties about
conditions in the country, mongering etc. of course, these are general
criticisms against all media institutions, whether private or public. State
media institutions are set up ostensibly to address these weaknesses of the
private media as well as to bring government programmes and policies closer to
the people and promote peaceful co- existence among the different groups in the
society in which they operate. But they are usually limited by their methods of
operation (Onukaba, 2005:5). 

The “battle cone” seems to be drawn between those who argue
unflinchingly that the best way to use the broadcast as a facilitator of
development in the third world is to have them owned and controlled by the
government and those that believe that the best result will be achieved by
making the electronic media dominantly a private sector affair. It is on this
fact that the researcher’s topic finds it footing, hence “the comparative study
of the performance of government owned and privately owned broadcasting media
organization” (a study of FRCN and Ray Power Radio). 

Somewhere
between the two extreme rolls are those who belong to what seems to be more
pragmatic position that government ownership and control of the media should co
–exist with private media ownership and that commercial broadcasting should
exist with private media to facilitate the job of broadcasters in the area of
socio- economic development of their nations. 

The
origin of the current government ownership and control of the broadcast media
in Nigeria can be traced to the history, purpose and nature of colonial
broadcasting services. It was mainly used for catering for the information and
entertainment needs of the predominantly colonial political and educated elites
in colonial Nigeria as well as the needs of the very few Nigerians educated
elites (Nwosu 1990: 120-121) 

Nigeria
has since had its independence in 1960 and has undergone many changes that make
it imperative that the broadcast media should change its operations and
structure to reflect the change situations. Although, the broadcasting system
of Nigeria has changed or broaden its aims, objectives and mode of operation
but the ownership and control structures or pattern still remains the
same. 

So
many reasons have been given by many Nigerian experts and policy makers for the
perpetuation of the ownership and control status quo. One of such reasons is
that the airwaves are limited and should, therefore, be regulated by the
government to ensure equity, order and fairness it has also been argued that
the role of broadcasting as an instrument of nation- building and development
is so important that it should not be left in the hands of private individuals
or organizations. 

The
fear has also been expressed that because radio and television are powerful
instruments of politicization, they careful into the hands of some unscrupulous
politicians or political groups who may misuse them to gain and hold political
power unfairly or propagate parochial political ideologies or ideas. There is
the question of funding proponents of government control and ownership insist
that broadcasting in Nigeria can never survive financially if it does not
depend on its government for financial subventions. 

It
is believed in many quarters that it is the above reason given for exclusive
government ownership and control broadcasting in Nigeria that has kept the
system unchanged until 1992. Hence, many Nigerians have yielded abundant
reasons in support of privatization of broadcasting. 

The
dominant belief of those who advocate privatization of broadcasting in Nigeria
seem to be that the electronic media practitioners would render the best
service when those media are operated as privately owned business or a commercial
enterprise. Among the reason given for making this conclusion is that the
electronic media would then be able to avoid unsuitable government influence
that content of broadcast news or current affairs in today’s Nigeria tend to be
politically biased. 

The
point that some people make is that private ownership of broadcast media allows
for healthy competition which could lead to improved services to the masses of
Nigeria. Related to this service of the masses is the argument that privately
owned broadcast media encourages diversity in production, programming and other
areas of broadcasting. 

By
1992, there was a lot of debate and protest against the monopoly of the
government in broadcasting business. Thus, there were clarion calls for
deregulation and decentralization of broadcast media establishment and
ownership. Hence, it was the contention of the people that a media system that
does not suffer undue restrictions and interference from government would
definitely become the best for the development democracy in the country (Nwosu
1990:22) 

It
was not until 24^th of august 1992 that the federal military
government under Babangida’s administration promulgated decrees number 38,
which established privatization of electronic media. It was in view of this
that Dr. Raymond Dopkesi; established Raypower which started broadcasting in
Lagos and later established Enugu station which is one of my study focus. 

It
is the development that gave rise to the contention as to which system of
ownership is preferable, hence, the relevance of the study at hand. 

1.2       Statement
of Research Problem 

Ownership of the media
house, its control and recruitment of its principal staff has formed the
influential factors consequent upon the programme quality of the media house
since the owners of the media house usually determine the aforementioned
factor. The media ownership has in some ways influenced the media progrmames
and this has posed problems to journalism as a trade. 

In
this case, the broadcast media have to function in tune with the whims and
caprices of the owner(s). Nothing runs the broadcast media practitioners  down as having the option of either following
the dictates of he owners or face the bitter music of being sacked. Ownership
influence on programme content has made many broadcasting media outfit to
collapse in operations and has also made them to loose their audience grip.
This is mostly true of government owned broadcast media. After the liberation
of media started springing up from all corners, one of which is Ray power FM
radio station. 

These
new privately owned media station produced standard programmes that out bids
that of the government owned media stations and as such, many people abandoned
government owned broadcast media. 

1.3       Objectives
of the Study 

The objective of this study will include: 

i To find out if the emergence of private broadcasting media in Nigeria
has improved broadcasting generally. 

ii.                 
To establish if the entrance of private broadcasting is
a challenge to government owned broadcast media in Nigeria. 

iii.               
To know if source credibility affects broadcast media
listenership. 

iv.               
To find out if Enugu radio listenership prefers private
radio programmes to government radio programmes. 

v.                 
To check whether the radio listenership use what they
hear from the radio. 

1.4       Research
Questions

i.                   
How does the emergence of private broadcasting
media in Nigeria improve broadcasting generally? 

ii.                 
To what extent is the entrance of private broadcasting
a challenge to government owned broadcast media in Nigeria? 

iii.               
How does source credibility affect broadcast media
listenership? iv. To what extent does the Enugu Radio listenership prefer
private radio v.

            programmes to government radio
programmes?  

v. To what extent does the radio listenership use what they
hear from radio? 

1.5       Research
Hypotheses 

The
following research hypothesis derives logically from the problem posed in the
research questions. 

Hi: The emergence of private broadcasting in Nigeria
improves broadcasting  generally. 

The
findings of this study “The comparative study of the performances of government
owned and privately owned broadcasting media organization” (A study of FRCN and
Raypower Radio station Enugu) will help other researcher in carrying out a
similar study. It will add to the mass communication literature and bulk of
knowledge on media performance in Nigeria. The study will help to analyze the
pattern of media ownership and its influence on Nigerian development. Finally,
it will provide the premise for individuals and stakeholders to make decisions
on which form of media ownership is better and needful in

Nigeria. 

1.7       Scope
of the Study 

The
researcher’s scope will center on comparatively studying government ownership
of media alongside privately owned media. The study focus will be on

FRCN and Ray power radio stations both in Enugu.

The population 

The
population selected is made up of the entire people who listens to

FRCN and Ray power radio stations. 

The sample 

The
sample size will be on those in Enugu metropolis. Due to time and financial
constraints and because the researcher is convinced that since FRCN and
Raypower FM are both situated in Enugu, it will offer a good sample for the
study. 

1.8 Operational Definition of Terms

Comparative study:- Based on the study, it means that the
researcher will study two media houses government owned (FRCN) and privately
owned (Raypower)

to find out
how similar  or different they are. 

Government owned
media organization:- This is represented by Federal Radio

Co-operation of Nigeria (FRCN)
which is part of the researcher’s study focus. It is owned by the federal
government of Nigeria. 

Privately owned broadcasting media:- It is represented by Raypower
FM, which is also part of the researcher’s study focus. It is owned by Raymond
Dopkesi, under the corporate name: DAAR Communications.