GBC’s Radio GAR now Uniiq FM

Uniiq 95.7 FM, the new station of the Ghana Broadcasting Corporation (GBC), which replaces Radio GAR was launched in Accra on Saturday with a call on the staff to differ its services from private stations some of which depend only on music and phone-ins.

"There is a large room for improvement where journalists need to display their professionalism by giving objective and factual reports to listeners," Ms Elizabeth Ohene, Minister of Media Relations, said.

She said journalists would do a great disservice to listeners if they depended on hearsay and information received through phone-ins by people who they could not identify.

Uniiq FM plans to go fully commercial in contrast to the former GAR, which tried to satisfy a whole range of diverse interests.

The target group of the new station is the middle and upper class and easy-going "money in pocket" people. Its business department would be relocated outside the gates of GBC to make clients avoid the bureaucratic nature of the security men.

Ms Ohene said the problem with GBC is not solely the lack of enough money to upgrade their equipment but also initiative to be adventurous.

This, she said, has made a lot of other stations to overtake them. There is the need for constant training for staff to upgrade their skills so as to meet current demands.

Ms Ohene said most advanced capitalist countries still insist that public broadcasting should be maintained, adding that the government would do what it could as quickly as possible to put the needed infrastructure in place.

Yaw Owusu Addo, Director of Radio said though Uniiq would be commercial, it would not lose sight of its constitutional duty and of being a pacesetter. "We shall remain politically neutral, circumspect, critical of ourselves and be responsible for the services we provide."

Seth Ago Adjetey, Director-General of GBC, said management appreciates the support of Ms Ohene, which has resulted in the creation of the new station.