TV7 disagrees with A3Z [1]
Saturday, September 26, 1998 - 10:00. Updated on Sunday, December 6, 2015 - 16:13.
From Matangi Tonga Magazine, Vol. 13, no. 3, October 1998.
Nuku‘alofa’s sole television broad-casting station, TV7, run by the Oceania Broadcasting Network, has declined to broadcast news items prepared by Radio Tonga staff.
“We had no agreement with Tavake Fusimalohi to broadcast their news tapes,” said Don Ludlow, Pacific Director for Chris Racine, the owner of OBN, based in Hawai‘i, after they read a report in the Matangi Tonga. “Tavake expressed a number of times that he had an agreement with us, but when he put in his proposals we have always said no, we intend to do our own news.”
Meanwhile, Tavake Fusimalohi, General Manager of the Tonga Broadcasting Commission, who told Matangi Tonga of the co-operation between the two organisations to produce television news for broadcasting before July 4, said that there had been an obvious breakdown in communication because the news production agreement was made with Ray Wick, the former manager of TV7. The TBC has a brand new $350,000 fully-equipped television studio, and some trained staff, but no television transmitting facilities. Tavake said that they were going ahead, producing news and documentaries, “and just storing the tapes.”