European soccer is an expensive and non-essential entertainment item.
If you are poor, you won't have time and money to waste on non-essential things.
The last thing a poor man needs is the ability to watch the UEFA champions league at home.
You can't watch it without a generator, anyway. So if you are truly poor, this thread shouldn't concern you.
If you are poor, and you love soccer, you would simply go out and watch it at a sports bar.

Let's be sincere with ourselves. What is wrong is wrong, regardless of whether the culprit is a Nigerian or not.
Using the government to steal a license from your competitor is wrong, period. What HiTV is doing is wrong.

Let's not be one sided in our analysis. Let's look at it from all sides. We all know that Nigeria is essentially a very corrupt nation. How did DSTV get their licence in the first place? How did they get their monopoly? Let's face the truth, they are all the same. DSTV has been enjoying this monopoly for a long time, and now that someone else is coming in to pull the rug, people are starting to cry foul.
I don't care about who benefits from this, as long as the average Nigerian enjoys the end results.
By the way, I do not think DSTV is going to be left completely dry, I am sure they will sort this thing out between themselves and reach a compromise. It's just plain politics.

I hv been vindicated by this development that this S/Africans will stop at nothin to kill and scuttle our dreams to be as great

nd 2 thk dey can do what cannot be conceived in south africa here is appauling

na wa o,

agnesoseka:

na wa o,

4 wetin

That DTSV held the rights for the broadcasting of the premiership matches doesnt mean the South Africans doesnt want us to be great, It means that they are simply more organised that us. Remember it is not the south Africans that are selling the rights, It is the English FA!I agree that the fees is too much and should be in the region of like 4-7K, Advocating anything less than this wont be fair at all because it isnt so so easy to do business in Nigeria. I use to work for a GSM company in Naija but i now work for one outside the country. When i compare the cost of running a site in Naija and here, The diffrence is unbelievable! naija has its peculiarities which makes doing business difficult, But the country normally makes up for this in terms of quantity you can sell.
Bottomline what DSTV charges is too much! and the way Nweke/NCC are dealing with the DTSV/HITV issue is just not right, Breaking DSTV's Monopoly is good, but whatever that is worth doing is worth doing well.

its all politics to me because the ncc and frank nweke were not around when the other companies were crying for help. if they are sincere why haven't they arrested bosses of other companies that show the english premiership and champions league.

and pls stop comlaining about the price of dstv. if you can't afford it take it like that. Not every rapper can afford a maybach.

its all politics to me because the ncc and frank nweke were not around when the other companies were crying for help. if they are sincere why haven't they arrested bosses of other companies that show the english premiership and champions league.

and pls stop comlaining about the price of dstv. if you can't afford it take it like that. Not every rapper can afford a maybach.

Hee hee hee hee. . . Chineke!

Abeg, make I hear word jare. Didn't you hear my brother from asia who said he watches great channels for chicken change? Abeg, what's good for the rich folks is also good for the poor folks. I'm not saying that what HITV is doing is good. All I've said is that it is good for the common Nigerian. Kapish!

_{*take a long breathe after reading all the posts*}


@Razorr
Im so much impressed by your contributions and your desire to make access to entertainment and information an equal thing. Of cos, u knw people (especially the so called "rich" will never want others to be where they are. _{(i have no apologies for no one )}. Always remember that im with you in this struggle of democratic slavery.

I just read an article now (hard copy), im really surprised at what our fellow nigerians are going through in the hands of DSTV. DSTV (Multichoice Nigeria)is a company i respected so much as far as i can remember. But the way it operates it monopolistic business is terrifying (not ready to go into details now).

We all knw running a satelite TV station is expensive, but im sure DSTV would have been forced to reduce its excessive tarrif if it were to be faced with competitors in the industry. I don not care wat some people said, is anything wrong if we all have access to satelite TV?

im sure the emergence of HITV would nip in the bud the arrogance of DSTV.



_{*got to attend to some stuff, wud be back soon*}

I paid a subscripion of like N27,000 (equivalent) to watch premiership, FA, Carling cup, Italian league, champion league, french league and the scotish league for a full year!!!, But that is where it ends, i still miss my DSTV like shit, NO reality, Discovery,National Geograpghic, history channel, Entertainment chanel, and African magic. If i want anything close to DSTV here, i have to pay like 110K for a year!!
@ Chief: wasnt that a little bit selfish of you? I dont think they pay as much as that for DSTV in South Africa so the price must be reduced and on the other hand, the issue with HITV needs to be put right! Let the thing be open, then people can go with whichever provider they want!!!

Its time someone puts order and sanity into the country.

@ Seun

Don't get me wrong o Seun. If you go through my post very well, I said I don't support intimidation in anyway in the first graph. I'm not saying we should be praising Niger Delta kidnappers for extorting money from foreigners or praise scammers for robbing foreigners to enrich themselves since they are "our people"

I don't support the idea of robbing Peter to pay Paul either. Try and look at it from this angle, if HiTV is doing well, it's a Naija owned company and at least the money is hopefully going to be circulated within the country directly or indirectly more than when the industry is fully run by a foreign company that will only probably take the profits away to develop their country.

Again, the law should take its course if DSTV is guilty of the allegations. Business as usual should not be encouraged and too bad if DSTV will be used as a scapegoat. Don't forget that before now, some other companies have been complaining of the monopoly of DSTV and it's effect in the industry. Maybe they couldn't get far because they are not well "connected".

If you feel that it's all politics or a matter of connection to some people that is causing all these, let's just say the new king for Egypt no send Joseph ni.

Nigeria is a country of illegality. We intimidate people who dont agree with us by arresting them. Why doesn't Nigerian Broadcasting Commsion tell us what type of broadcasting license DSTV acquired. If we are talking about rights, would new GSM companies stop MTN, CELTEL and GLO from delivering services to Nigeria. DSTV and HITV cannot even cover the markets in Nigeria and government is already witchhunting investors.The same monopoly we accuse DSTV of, is what HITV wants. I know for sure that not more 10% of Nigerians have cable, why cant these two companies increase the number to about 30 million Nigerians by lowering their prices. The competition is good but not with force

Competition is good bt DSTV shld rest abeg.

i swear na wa for NCC cos dis is not fair, i cant imajin how many DSTV subscribers ave 2 be thinkin bout watchn UEFA cos of whatsoever their names are, cnt they just share sum of d rights, d jus wanna kill DSTV slowly-am laffin e no go happen

I dont know why we dont do the right thing in our country, Everything must be done with Politics in Mind, Why cant DSTV and HITV work together for instance? and If there is rivalry between them, why should it be that it is the subscribers that will suffer. Let me give you guys a scenario in the middle east, The docoders are easily available in the open market and you can use it to view any satelitte channnel as long as you are subscribed to it. Now ART(Arab Radio and Television) and Al jazeera sports are two rival broadcasters, ART has UEFA CL, Premiership, Scotish league and french league rights and Aljazeera has Italian league, Spanish league, English FA cup and carling cup rights BUT you can subscribe to both of them by buying a single Card!!why can we have something like that in Naija??

We can't have that sort of thing in naija because we do not love ourselves! Greed has become the rule rather than the exception!

That has nothing to do with greed. It's about being smart enough to explore new opportunities to make more money.

I don't support the idea of robbing Peter to pay Paul either.

But, from the rest of your post, you support the idea of robbing DSTV to pay HiTV. Isn't that rather hypocritical?

Don't forget that before now, some other companies have been complaining of the monopoly of DSTV and it's effect in the industry

It is normal for incompetent competitors to complain about monopoly instead of working harder to attract customers. If DSTV didn't use any criminal or regulatory methods to obtain its "monopoly" it can be broken by a more competent competitor. These guys know that they are not better than DSTV, so they are manipulating the government into doing their work for them. That is very shameful. Where is the pride of the entrepreneurs at HiTV?

Haaaaaaaaaa. . .

In my opinion, HITV is simply the lesser of two evils! At least their services would benefit the average Nigerian.

I don't understand why folks are saying DSTV is being robbed.

If I recall the genesis of this issue correctly, it started with the government complaining to the English Premier League that they don't want the premier league rights for Nigeria to be bunched together with South Africa. Given that, the Premier League separated the rights and put it up for auction. I believe both DSTV and HITV bidded and HITV won the rights. If that is the case, why should DSTV still continue to show the matches? Have people forgotten that FSTV couldn't get off the ground because they couldn't get the proper programming that attracts Nigerian viewers. Let's be frank, the major driver for satellite TV ownership in Nigeria is the football (premier league, uefa CL etc).

I don't see anything wrong in what the government has done to support a Nigerian business. There's no illegality in it, it's just recognizing the market drivers and positioning the NIGERIAN company to be able to access it. At least if DSTV wanted the rights so much they could have bidded twice what HITV bidded. Now that they don't have it, it's illegal to show it, SIMPLE!! Flout the law, get your ass in jail!!

People forget that the US gave most of the contracts in Iraq to Halliburton. That's what a respectable govt does, you favor your businesses anywhere you have a leverage.

If I recall the genesis of this issue correctly, it started with the government complaining to the English Premier League that they don't want the premier league rights for Nigeria to be bunched together with South Africa.

DSTV bought and paid for the broadcast licenses with the expectation that Nigeria is included. This was a transaction between two foreign entities. Nigeria has no right to change the terms of that transaction. Period.

It's like going to the market to buy a complete car, and after buying it they tell you the engine isn't included.

Seun:
DSTV bought and paid for the broadcast licenses with the expectation that Nigeria is included. This was a transaction between two foreign entities. Nigeria has no right to change the terms of that transaction. Period.

Don't forget that Nigeria reserves the right to ban any foreign broadcast that is against her interest. So your "foreign entities" must respect the interest of the market in their contract.

That's bullshit. Might is not right. Just because Nigeria can do something, doesn't mean she should.

Protecting the interest and welfare of Nigerians trumps any contract rights, especially foreign contracts.

I disagree with that. It's not even debateable.

However, I don't see how this move by the government protects the rights of the thousands of DSTV subscribers.

Exactly and believe me guys at the end of the day, we subscribers will be amongs the losers! IT remains to be seen what quality of programming HITV will bring to us, but i really doubt if they can keep the fees that low if they want to bring on the really good channels, So what is likely to happen is that they wont bring include thegood channels in order to keep the fees low or they are forced to increase the price so that they can bring on the good channels, i know a lot of people bought DSTV because of the premiership but DSTV is not just about supersport! For me i ejoy watching reality, E! channel, Discovery, History,national G, A. magic as much as supersport.

I think we need some posers here.

Who will benefit from these developments:
The government? Nigerians(Satellite TV subscribers?)?
HITV? DSTV?

abdblues, I can authoritatively tell you that HITV would be showing E channel, CNN, MTV base, and some movie and entertainment channels. They have their own edition of Africa Majic, that would show purely african movies. They ofcourse would also have sports channels for the Premiership, Champios league, e.t.c.
I'm not sure of what other channels they have. Anyone with these information should please let us have it.

Seun,

you are wrong. I can not go into a contract with somebody to come and be producing "pure water" in my sitting room and include your own sitting room too in the arrangement without telling. Such a contract will not be binding if you kick against it. Let's see how they work it out, may the strongets entity win.

[b]DSTV subscription fee is way too much for a country like Nigeria. Too bad it has gotten to the level of arresting their boss but another point I want to make is that foreign companies do a lot of illegal things they can't do in their country in Nigeria because of corruption. If DSTV is truely guilty of the accusations, then let the law take its course. We should start sending signals out to everyone that "business as usual" can't continue anymore. Even at that, I won't support intimidation by anyone.

Some other factors also add to the cost indirectly like lack of constant power supply from PHCN so you have to generate power yourself again to enjoy your subscription. Then if you can scale that huddle, pray you don't spend over half of your viewing time in bad traffic trying to get home from work (or wherever) if you live in Lagos . The bottom line is that at the long run most subscribers underutilize their subscription.

As for HiTV, let's pray they will deliver quality services. If it eventually turns out completely to be transfer of monopoly of the business from DSTV to HiTV, at least we can console ourselves that it is our own people monoplizing the business and not some foreigners. [/b]

@ Seun

Haba Seun, before you say I'm being hypocritical oya tell me which part of the post that I said Peter should be robbed to pay Paul. Maybe you are just getting me wrong.
Also, I don't completely agree with you that only incompetent competitors complain of monopoly o. Sometimes if another player as so much advantage, even the competent ones may look incompetent

There have been quite a few interesting posts since this debate began but I think I need to add a few things too. The chap behind the company Hitv is a lawyer, Toyin Subair. I have been following news and reports about all the right to the EPL, since it was unbundled from DStv, starting from August and there are a few things that I think we have not considered in our discource.

First, the guy used to be something of a legal consultant to Dstv so he should know them better. The whole pay tv business as it is being operated does not pay Nigeria and Nigerians. The money that people pay help to fund contents for television and develop that industry.Do you know that the executives of the EPL were billed to visit Nigeria as part of the developmental package that are incentives to the broacast right; one or two premiership team(s) will have a pre season tour in Nigeria(all of them wont go the USA or Europe if they see cheaper alternatives) members of the NFA/NFL went to England with the Hitv team when the rights were facilitated. They are talking about some collaboration. Thing is, if you pay that kind of money, some things should come as extras.

how did supersport benefit our football in a developmental way apart from showing us matches? Ajax has an affliliate team in Cape town. Are there more football potentials in SA than Nigeria? These are isues that we must face as a people, not class assess to pay TV or the now commmon Naija bashing that people fall back to.

We must hope that the effort of this ambitous people will help facilitate assess to infromation and entertainment as well a develop our televisison content.


Dstv has done a great job of showing us great channels;what we dont know is that the money we pay help develop the content for their country's television and entertainment.
Invariably, we have to take our destiny into our hands and the time is now.

And people who have been talking about high cost of business in Nigeria. DStv is snot a gsm company and sso, even though they use generators, they do not deploy it the way Gsn companies do per cell sites.

Hitv will be charging 3,000 per month. Apart from the foreign station, they will developing our local television stations sthrough adequate funding to provide content for all Nigerians.
I know many wil start the Naija bashing because they have a false sense of the posibilities amidst all our challenges but I believe that these thing can fly.Nigerians are smart people and we have all it take to pull this one off.

we were all in this country when a certain South African telecommunications company said it was not possible to have per second billing until 2010.Well, a Nigerian company did it;miraculously, the company that said it cant be done found the formula. This i just a repeat!

'the man who says it can not be done should not disturb the man who is doing it' -chinese proverb