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Niger unions threaten to take World Cup off air
June 17th, 2010 - 12:19 UTC
by Andy Sennitt.
As millions of people around the globe jostle for position in front of TV screens showing the World Cup football, unions in West African country Niger are threatening a strike that could take the event off air there. Niger’s state television channel, broadcasting matches live, has angered communication workers’ unions by allowing private TV networks to freely retransmit the signal.
“We will never accept that the national television channel’s signal can be freely retransmitted by private TV,” said a letter to the communications minister from journalists’ union Syntrapresse and information workers’ union Sainfo. The two groups have threatened to hold a strike today and tomorrow over the issue. If enough workers join in, it could prevent the national station from broadcasting, which would in turn stop private channels from showing matches.
Many commentators, and companies using the contest in South Africa as a marketing tool, are keen to portray the World Cup as a pan-African event, but only six of the continent’s 53 countries are competing. Niger, a largely Muslim desert nation thousands of miles north South Africa, is not one of them. The country, perhaps more than any other, appears to be taking a curmudgeonly attitude to the month-long event. Even before the opening ceremony last Friday, its deadening effect on the workforce was being lamented.
“Here in Niger it will, more than anything else, disrupt the normal running of public bodies because football fans, whether they are directors or employees, will be glued to their television screens and will ignore their duties,” said Garba Abdou, a civil servant in the capital Niamey.
June 17th, 2010 - 12:19 UTC
by Andy Sennitt.
As millions of people around the globe jostle for position in front of TV screens showing the World Cup football, unions in West African country Niger are threatening a strike that could take the event off air there. Niger’s state television channel, broadcasting matches live, has angered communication workers’ unions by allowing private TV networks to freely retransmit the signal.
“We will never accept that the national television channel’s signal can be freely retransmitted by private TV,” said a letter to the communications minister from journalists’ union Syntrapresse and information workers’ union Sainfo. The two groups have threatened to hold a strike today and tomorrow over the issue. If enough workers join in, it could prevent the national station from broadcasting, which would in turn stop private channels from showing matches.
Many commentators, and companies using the contest in South Africa as a marketing tool, are keen to portray the World Cup as a pan-African event, but only six of the continent’s 53 countries are competing. Niger, a largely Muslim desert nation thousands of miles north South Africa, is not one of them. The country, perhaps more than any other, appears to be taking a curmudgeonly attitude to the month-long event. Even before the opening ceremony last Friday, its deadening effect on the workforce was being lamented.
“Here in Niger it will, more than anything else, disrupt the normal running of public bodies because football fans, whether they are directors or employees, will be glued to their television screens and will ignore their duties,” said Garba Abdou, a civil servant in the capital Niamey.