MONROVIA, October 15 (LINA) – The Senate Chair on Information and Broadcast, Senator Henry Yallah, has stressed the need for adequate funding to the Liberia Broadcasting System (LBS) to help narrow the gap of distrust the people have in their government.
Yallah said the tendency of distrust can be curtailed through the dissemination of “proper” information to the public on the state-owned LBS because, according to him, it has the widest coverage next to the UN radio.
He noted that the continuous absence of LBS from the airwaves has the propensity to give rise to “insecurity and instability” in the country, because some private media institutions could manipulate the situation to promote selfish interests rather than the national development agenda.
The Bong County Lawmaker made the call in an interview with the Liberia News Agency via mobile phone on Wednesday.
Senator Yallah told LINA that the Management of LBS is appealing to his committee to lobby for passage of the institution’s estimated budget of US$4.2million for Fiscal Year 2014/15.
He disclosed that LBS proposes to extend its service to other counties such as, River Gee, Gbarpolu, Nimba, and Sinoe, through community radios to ensure that Liberians have access to public information.
It can be recalled that since the eruption of the Ebola crisis, the state-owned broadcaster has been on and off air due to “lack of funding for the purchase of fuel oil and maintenance of equipment.”
LINA WTD/PSN/TSS/PTK/JKW