In 1994, when residents in Accra woke up one morning to hear a radio station blaring out copious melodious music, but not from the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation, Ghanaians realised that private broadcasting had been actualised.!
That was how Radio Eye really opened the eyes of Ghanaians to the fact that when in 1977, the Supreme Military Council by SMC Decree 71 and its subsequent Legislative Instrument 1121/1977 established the Ghana Frequency Registration and Control Board, the way was paved for the operation to guide the conduct of private radio broadcast.
It meant that the right to operate private radio was not original to the 1992 Constitution, except that it drew public attention to the possibility of private individuals owning and operating radio, provided they were registered to do so.
It thus means that the operators of Radio Eye gave meaning and function to the privatisation of radio.
That is why the 26th Anniversary of the founding of Radio Eye (if for operating for only a month it could be described as still-born) is worth celebrating.
But What were the reasons for the shut down OF RADIO EYE??
According to myjoyonline.com Charles Wereko-Brobby has written a book which will reveal the untold story behind Radio Eye shut down in 1994.
Charles Wereko-Brobby aka Tarzan has announced that his upcoming book will reveal the story behind why the Ghana Police seized Radio Eye’s equipment in 1994 among other stories that liberalised the radio broadcasting landscape in Ghana.
In 2014, former board member of the National Media Commission (NMC), Godfred Akoto Ampaw revealed that Ghana’s first private radio station’s equipment had not been released despite a 20-year-old court ruling that the equipment should be released to Radio Eye management.
Revealing that the equipment has still not been released to the station’s management, Tarzan said on Joy FM’s Super Morning Show, Thursday 13th February 2020,
“[The equipment] should be somewhere at the CID office. But you know there’s history of things at police custody getting missing.
So we are hoping that they are still out there and we will formally make an application to collect them and then maybe put it in the national archives or museum.”
Radio Eye’s operations ushered in a new age for independent radio broadcasting and provided a platform for mutliple voices to be heard in the country.
However, it’s time was short lived when the Police CID seized their equipment and arrested the station’s management after weeks of airing in 1994.
“The story of how all this happened plus the experience of who has made it all happen including your own CEO will be told in the forthcoming book that we call, Plenty Talk Dey for Ghana,” he told host of the show, Daniel Dadzie.
Sources : Graphic.com,
Myjoyonline.com and http://african-research.com/
