TopStar management has denied accusations of heavily inflated transmission fees to Zambian TV stations claiming their operations are affected by the fee structure for frequency.
TopStar transmission charges are reported to be around K800,000 per month.
TV stations have accused TopStar of being both a signal distributor and content provider but at a meeting held with TV station owners last week – TopStar Communications management said the compnay was responsible for national digital migration and the partnership with ZNBC allowed the decoders to carry different content.
TopStar is a joint venture between ZNBC and China’s StarTimes.
Recently ZICTA announced the awarding of the public signal distributor license to Multichoice who have been operating in Zambia for the past 22 years and have invested US$14 million in 8 transmitters.
TopStar claims to have erected 43 transmitters in one year and have signal coverage in urban and rural Zambia with the Western and North-Western provinces to be connected to transmission in April.
The TV owners that attended the meeting with TopStar management have demanded that government review the Digital Migration project to make sure all players on the market benefit.
Prime TV owner Gerald Shawa led the delegation of TV owners and was joined by others from Camnet, ABN TV, Diamond TV, TBN Zambia, Healing Centre Tv, Revelation TV, ACTS TV, Catholic TV, Hope Channel, City Tv and CBC TV.
Meanwhile, TopStar Zambia has assured soccer fans in the country that it will televise live all the 64 FIFA Russia 2018 World Cup matches.
ZANIS reports that TopStar Sales Director, Cliff Sichone disclosed the development during the company’s launch of the Ndiye Itambika campaign ahead of the Easter season.
Mr. Sichone said with the Ndiye Itambika campaign, Top Star has slashed prices of the company’s combo decoder from K299 to K199 in order to avail Zambians an opportunity to access affordable and quality TV programming ranging from sports to drama and other entertainment programmes.
The campaign will see new customers of TopStar anywhere in the country get a month’s free subscription in addition to the combo decoder kit which can be obtained from any outlet across the country.
Mr. Sichone said Top Star being a leader in digital migration is proud to share the benefits of the on-going digital migration to Zambians across the country.
He stated that Top Star is committed to the process of ensuring that more Zambians own satellite TV kit anywhere in the country.
Mr. Sichone said this is part of the reason his company has launched the Ndiye Itambika campaign in order to fulfil part of its mandate of implementing digital migration.
He added that TopStar has in the last six months spread coverage of the digital signal to over districts across the country and that satellite coverage is countrywide.
Why are they charging them? Is it for carrying their signals?
See – if you do not add value to anything you will pay for nothing. The Internet is now an infrastructure – we now need to ensure that we add our technological know-how as well as our value addition (developers, security specialists, communications gurus, etc.) so that we can drive the financial gain. As usual, we are at the mercy of those who are exerting just a little more effort to make things happen and then complaining after the fact. Awe kwena mwe…
Docile Zambians how can you let these thieves sell off ZNBC?
When your father has two wives and you are a child of either of them you are likely to grow up with bitterness. That bitterness is often directed at others because you cannot tell your father that lazybum father why did you “polygamy” them and us! You see it in speech of children mostly due to insecurity and lack of love!
What you see them do is a reflection of the home and the heart condition.