ABIDJAN
State authorities in Cameroon have closed down the operations of two private-owned television stations, RTA and Canal 2, Reporters sans frontières (RSF) reported on Friday. The move, RSF said, threatens the development of diverse and independent broadcast media in Cameroon.
Provincial governors suspended broadcasts by the two stations on 19 February "at the behest of Communications Minister Jacques Fame Ndongo" on the grounds that they were operating illegally, RSF said. The two companies, it explained, had been authorised to carry foreign media programmes but not to broadcast their own programmes.
"Although the country's laws provide for privately-owned broadcast media, the government has ignored all requests from television broadcasters for authorisation, forcing them to operate illegally," RSF said. "AEA and TV+, the companies that own the television stations, do not have permits to set up and run privately-owned broadcast companies".
However, according to RSF, the "minister's decision followed the broadcast of a number of political debates in which the government was criticised".
According to the media watchdog, Ndongo has publicly attacked the media, accusing them of "repeatedly and intentionally disregarding the profession's universal and sacrosanct principles by interfering in an untimely manner in the private lives of citizens and government bodies." He also warned broadcast media entrepreneurs that the government would increase its efforts to collect back taxes from them, RSF said.
There is only one other privately-owned television channel in Cameroon. RSF said it had urged the authorities to take the necessary steps to regulate the status of all broadcast media and, in particular, to allow RTA and Canal 2 to resume their operations.
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