By Khairul Khalid
Bernama TV is facing serious financial woes and unable to pay staff wages. Is the national news agency Bernama dodging responsibility for this mess?
Bernama TV, a major news organisation, is having some major problems delivering very major news to its own staff, albeit under dire circumstances.
The broadcasting arm of Bernama (National News Agency of Malaysia) is in financial straits. It has been delaying salaries, one of the surest signs that a company is in deep trouble.
After weeks of dawdling, Bernama TV’s management has finally come clean. The company’s funds have run dry.
There’s not much left in the kitty, thus Bernama TV has resorted to dishing out a paltry RM500 each to about 100 workers as “part payment” of their salaries, while neglecting to mention when the other part (or parts) of the payment will arrive.
It is uncertain whether Ibrahim Yahaya, Bernama TV’s CEO, is also getting a RM500 “part payment”. Nevertheless, Bernama TV staff are now taking their case to the labour department.
How has it come to this?
Bernama TV has been struggling to stay afloat ever since it was launched in 2008. Poor viewership and ratings have suffocated advertising revenue, the lifeline of any free-to-air TV station. Some proposals have been made to streamline its programming and redeploy resources to reduce costs.
Things are made even more complicated by the issue of ownership and control. Despite its association with Bernama, the government’s newswire, Bernama TV is owned by a private entity called Bernama TV Synergy. Bernama is only a minority shareholder in Bernama TV Synergy with a 33% stake.
But hang on. Despite its minority status, Bernama owns the broadcasting licence for Bernama TV and has been fully in charge of operations since the end of 2011. Confused? Join the club. Even some of Bernama TV’s own staff have claimed that they aren’t quite sure who their real bosses are.
In essence, Bernama TV is a private vehicle riding on the long-established Bernama brand, facilities and resources, but is not quite Bernama’s. Now that Bernama TV is a fast sinking ship, Bernama seems even more keen to disentangle itself from the station, claiming that it is financially unable to prop it up any longer.
And what about the real owners of Bernama TV? The majority shareholders remain mysteriously silent and anonymous, even in the company’s greatest hour of need.
“The (majority) shareholders seem to not care, or are unaware of what’s going on,” said Multimedia and Communications Minister Ahmad Shabery Cheek, while not naming names.
“Bernama TV can’t force the government to pay (their salaries). That’s wrong,” Ahmad said, referring to Bernama’s minority status.
It is a shambolic state of affairs for a national news agency. A broadcast station bearing its national acronym is going down the drain, livelihoods are in jeopardy and Bernama is hiding behind technicalities, disavowing any responsibility.
Regardless of their shareholdings, Bernama has to be held firmly accountable for this fiasco. After all, the government news agency was the one who allowed for such a peculiar extension of its brand name and services in the first place, ceding ownership and control to a private company, whose majority shareholders are nowhere to be seen or heard.
Any other state media entity, say RTM (Radio Television Malaysia), is unlikely to approve a similar business arrangement. Clearly, this hasn’t served national interests at all, which Bernama is supposed to uphold.
The most immediate and pressing concern, though, must be the welfare of Bernama TV’s staff who have been left entirely in the dark about their future.
The fact that Bernama TV is failing as a business is not entirely surprising given a tough media market, but how it has treated its workers — with a distinct lack of transparency and good faith — is the shocker.
Bernama TV management must have known that its financial woes were fast reaching critical point a long time ago. It could and should have been more forthcoming about this to the workers, explored options quickly and taken decisive action.
For example, it could have considered restructuring staff salary or severance packages. This would have afforded the staff at least some time to deal with the painful reality and allowed them to plan their next career moves.
Instead, Bernama TV allowed the rot to fester until they finally dropped the RM500 bombshell.
Regardless, Bernama TV (or is it Bernama?) should pay its workers their due — to quote its own proud slogan — “Right and Now”.
GRRRRR!!!
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