CONTACTS: +254 726879488 (Mobile)
+254770 455 116 (Office)
Government Advertising Agency (GAA) and multi-billion advertising empire SCANAD could be forced to offer their extensive client network in the local market, if the country moves ahead with plans to initiate market study on dominance in advertising space.
Forcing the two dominant advertising agencies to relinquish some of their clienteles was one of the key concerns a section of local broadcasters and media owners Monday called on the market regulator, Communications Authority (CA) to address.
The group, most of whom are community-based radio stations, stand-alone TV stations and other digital platforms called for a cross-channel advertising approach to create a level-playing field and open the market on revenue sharing for small players – who are locked out of advertising business from their stable outfits.
“…though it was not put in our budget, we will look for revenue elsewhere to conduct a market study on the subject,” said Communications Authority’s Director General Francis Wangusi, during a stakeholders forum that drew ministry officials, media owners and broadcasters and policy makers in the industry.
Wangusi said the proposed market study planned for 2019 will also seek to address issues affecting the industry with market dominance in the advertising space thought to be critical.
“First we hope to have a standing committee in the next week consisting of all stakeholders, in different agencies, ourselves, the ministry and media fraternity…the study should commence next year and it will be a transparent undertaking with consultations including public participation,” said Wangusi.
GAA, a centralised State agency controls all government media advertising for print advertisements under the weekly MyGov pullout, while SCANAD is believed to control about 85 percent of all private sector media advertisements, with giant media houses such as Nation Media Group (NMG), Royal Media Services (RMS) and Standard Media Group (SG) having profited from the $70million advertising firm.
The proposed plan comes months after CA in partnership with British firm, MS Analysys Mason commissioned a controversial Telcoms report that steered clear of declaring Safaricom a dominant player in the industry as was widely expected. The report however, found Safaricom to being a dominant player in the retail markets for mobile communications and mobile money.