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The Federal Government said on Tuesday that it has succeeded in jamming the transmission signals of Radio Biafra, which had been operating illegally as a pirate station broadcasting from an unknown location.
But Radio Biafra, the controversial pirate radio station, is still on the airwaves, still broadcasting, TheCable has reported.
Dr Yemi Folasade-Esan, Permanent Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Information, told State House correspondents after he had briefed President Muhammadu Buhari on the activities of the ministry.
Folasade-Esan said that Buhari was adequately briefed on the activities of the illegal radio station and the successful blocking of its transmission signals.
“We also gave a report on (Radio Biafra) because right now, the signals from Radio Biafra have been jammed. The National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) has successfully jammed it.
“The NBC is also working with security operatives to get those that are behind that radio because it is an illegal radio.
“It is not licensed by anybody to be on Nigeria’s airwaves.”
The permanent secretary disclosed that she also briefed the President on the activities of the nine parastatals and agencies under the ministry as well as the Federal Information Centres in the states.
According to her, the president raised concern about piracy and instructed the ministry to work harder to reduce piracy to ensure that the producers of intellectual property such as Nigerian movies, get what is due to them.
Folasade-Esan identified inadequate funding as one of the major challenges the ministry and its agencies were experiencing.
She said that the ministry was considering resuscitating its Federal information services in each state considering their importance to the success of its mandate.
“Most of the challenges have to do with adequate funding. We talked especially about National Press Centre that is not working up to the level it should work.
“We also talked about the Federal Information Centres. You will recall that we have Federal Information Centres in every state of the federation.
“They are not working optimally as well and we brought that to the fore because that is actually one of the strengths of the Federal Ministry of Information.
“We also talked a lot about the external publicity and the possibility of reopening the Federal Information Services abroad.”
Though the federal government claimed to have sent Radio Biafra off the airwaves, checks by TheCable revealed that the controversial pirate radio station is still broadcasting.
Yemi Folasade-Esan, permanent secretary in the Ministry of Information, had earlier said that the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) had jammed signals of the station.
But dismissing her claim, the station said the Federal government cannot silence it. “NBC lied to their master. Radio Biafra is live in BiafraLand. They cannot even ban our local station, do they even know we also transmit via satellite and online as well,” the station wrote on Twitter.
TheCable received its broadcasts when it tuned to the radio station late Tuesday. The content of the station, which came into existence some months ago, is known to be divisive.
