FORMER President Dr Bharrat Jagdeo issued a radio licence to Dr. Ranjisinghi ‘Bobby’ Ramroop, owner of the Vieira Communications Television Channel 28 (VCT 28) in the face of a court order, and enjoyed very little discretion in making his decision; because, in 1993, businessman Anthony Vieira, previous owner of the VCT Channel 28, had challenged in court the then refusal to grant his entity a radio licence.

Legal Affairs Minister, Attorney General Anil Nandlall, told media operatives at a Peoples Progressive Party / Civic (PPP/C) press engagement this past week that this matter had been thoroughly ventilated in the courts, and had reached the level of the Appeals Court.
Rejecting what he called an ethnic profiling that has now transcended reportage on the issue, Nandlall said, “That matter went all the way to Court of Appeal,” and he reminded that it culminated in a 2010 ruling which directed the authorities to grant VCT 28 a licence.
The Appellate Judges were Chancellor Justice Carl Singh, Justice B.S. Roy and Justice Yonnette Cummings-Edwards.
They ruled that the redress was granted under Article 153 for the contravention of Vieira’s fundamental rights, guaranteed by Articles 40, 146 and 149 of the Guyana Constitution.
Accordingly, Nandlall said, the then President, Dr Bharrat Jagdeo, who at the time also served as Minister of Information, had very little discretion in respect to the application for a licence for VCT Channel 28.
Nandlall believes this fact has not been given any prominence in the reportage of the radio licence saga, but there has instead been a direct attempt to submerge the information.
Nandlall thinks it is indeed correct that reportage on the VCT licence be treated differently from the others, because Dr Ranjisinghi ‘Bobby’ Ramroop, who heads Queens Atlantic Investment Inc (QAII), purchased the VCT 28 media house in 2009, which authorities say entitles him to secure the radio licence issued to the entity in 2011.
VCT 28 was later rebranded Television Guyana Inc. (TVG), and Dr Ramroop is on record as saying “President Jagdeo gave our company nothing, absolutely nothing…We bought this component of the electronic media from Tony Vieira in a private transaction.”
This past week, Nandlall told media operatives, “I am saying that the manner in which the radio licence story is carried in certain media houses shows a discernible ethnic bias and ethnic profiling, in the sense that you only see a certain group of persons whose photographs appear with amazing regularity.” The Attorney General questioned: “How many times have you seen Bobby (photograph published in relation to the articles) in comparison to the other successful applications, inclusive of Rudy Grant or Maxwell Thom of Wireless Connections? As far as I know, Vieira sold the operations.”
Just before demitting office in 2011, former President Dr Bharrat Jagdeo broke Government’s monopoly on the radio waves by granting some 10 licences to applicants who were awaiting approval. Among them was VCT’s application, one of the first in the system; but at the time approval was granted, Vieira had already sold his company and all rights to Dr Ramroop.