GBC Loses $5m Annually Over Unpaid DTT Mast Usage – Director General

The Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC) says it is losing an estimated 5 million dollars annually due to the government’s failure to pay for the use of its masts in operating the national Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) platform.

The DTT platform, which provides the transmission backbone for Ghana’s transition from analogue to digital broadcasting, relies heavily on infrastructure owned by GBC.

During an engagement with the Parliamentary Committee on Communication and Information, the Director General of GBC, Prof. Amin Alhassan, expressed concern that the state broadcaster has been sidelined financially despite its critical role in the project.

“GBC owns the masts on which the national DTT is rolled out for all TV channels to operate. We do not earn anything from it. That was a missed opportunity, and we still think something can be done about it,” Prof. Alhassan stated.

He explained that had GBC been properly compensated, it could have generated between 5 and 7 million dollars annually. “The national DTT plan is sitting on GBC’s assets. And as landlords, we should be benefiting from that. You can’t take assets of GBC, roll out a DTT plan for nothing, and we don’t get anything,” he said.

The Director General further urged the government to provide fair compensation if it intends to use GBC’s infrastructure for the rollout of the upcoming 5G network.