The Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC), has refuted claims that it received $3 million from the Ministry of Youth and Sports as full payment for coverage of the 2023 African Games.
The state broadcaster said the allegation is entirely false, describing the revelation as “shocking”.
Director General of the GBC made this known in an interview in response to the allegation, saying GBC only received a sum of $105,000 for its entire coverage of the games hosted in Ghana from March 8-23, 2024.
The allegation was made by the Sports Ministry at the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament on Monday, August 19.
“GBC was the official broadcaster for the 13th All African Games, and I can confirm that full payment has been made to GBC. I can’t remember the exact amount, but I know that it is in the excess of $3 million,” the Minister for Youth and Sports, Mustapha Ussif, told parliament.
But Professor Amin Alhassan said nothing more than $105,000 was paid as a benefit to the GBC for dedicating its channel.
“I think yesterday I was one of those who was shocked to learn that the minister of youth and sports said that they had paid GBC in excess of $3 million and I want to assure every Ghanaian and the public that GBC’s total benefit from the African Games was $105,000 us dollars equivalent. Nothing more was paid as a benefit to GBC. And that payment was as support for the fact that we dedicated an entire channel 24 hours. We suspended normal programming for the GTV Sports+ and dedicated it to the All African games. And for our role as the official broadcaster. that is what the GBC was paid and not in excess of $3 million,” he responded.
Prof Alhassan further explained that the amount was used to offset the corporation’s opportunity cost.
“When you suspend a channel’s normal programming, there is an opportunity cost, so it’s used to offset the cost of the channel not doing regular programming. So there is a loss of business. So it’s important to point out that when you take an entire channel 24 hours for two weeks, it comes at a cost, and that was what the money was for. So it was for our revenue. $105,000 and not in excess of 3 million dollars.”