Pay-TV subscribers get free access to public channels
CCK director-general Francis Wangusi (left) with the East African Communications Organisations executive secretary Hodge Semakula (centre) and Tanzania Communication Regulatory Authority’s John Nkoma in Nairobi on Wednesday. Photo/Salaton Njau
What you need to know:
CCK chief says it is illegal for providers to block access to public channels such as NTV, KBC, KTN, Citizen, K24, NTV and Kiss TV for non-payment.
Pay TV service providers usually switch off viewers yet to pay for programmes including public broadcasts.
Subscribers of pay- TV services will be allowed to watch at least five free-to-air channels even when in default of monthly payments.
Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK) director-general Francis Wangusi said on Wednesday it would be illegal for providers to block access to public channels such as NTV, KBC, KTN, Citizen, K24, NTV and Kiss TV.
“The commission has put a mandate on the minimum number of free to air channels that the pay television must carry,” said Mr Wangusi. Pay TV service providers usually switch off viewers yet to pay for programmes including public broadcasts.
“The free to air channels providers are supposed to offer their content for free to pay TV stations since they are not allowed to resell the content to pay TV providers,” Mr Wangusi added.
A CCK report showed that the 224,000 set top boxes that have been bought in readiness for migration to digital TV are owned by pay television providers StarTimes, Gotv and Zuku who do not guarantee access to free to air channels. CCK said that only 11,000 free to air set top boxes had so far been sold by independent dealers.
The high sales of the multi-channel decoders by pay TV providers is attributed to pricing with the gadgets costing between Sh1,999 and Sh2,500. The price of free to air set top boxes ranges between Sh4,500 to Sh6,500.
Subscribers for pay TV services, however, have to pay monthly fees ranging between Sh499 and Sh6,800 which CCK fears may not be sustained by low income earners, necessitating the protection of free to air services.
CCK has been lobbying the Treasury to find ways of making the free to air gadgets more affordable after a waiver on import duty in June last year failed to achieve the desired impact on prices.
The switch to digital migration is expected to expand opportunities for investors in digital terrestrial TV, broadcast mobile TV, commercial wireless broadband services, and help in disaster relief while offering viewers wider choice.
The country has rolled out digital television infrastructure to 70 per cent of the population. Digital signals are currently available in Nairobi, Mombasa, Nakuru, Kisumu, Eldoret, Nyeri, Webuye, and Meru.
In 2011, the government allowed the importation of set-top boxes on the Digital Video Broadcast Technology 2 (DVB-T2) that could access both pay and free-to-air channels.
Last August, CCK removed the “conditional access” feature which costs Sh3,400 from the technology in the hope that traders would pass on the benefit to end users. The feature allows pay TV broadcasters to control what viewers watch.
The Regional Radio Communication Conference held in Geneva in 2006 set a 2015 deadline for migration to digital TV, but the five East African Community member states set their deadline for December 2012.
