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A mere three years ago any Iraqi caught with a satellite dish tucked away on a balcony or rooftop would have a faced a 500,000 dinar ($400) fine and six months behind bars. Following the US-led invasion a privilege that was once confined to party officials and the influential was suddenly available to all, and demand for satellite TV skyrocketed. Within two years Iraq had one of the highest satellite penetrations in the world. And from three national TV channels, and 10 officially sanctioned TV channels under Saddam Hussein’s regime, Iraqis are now able to zap through 300-plus satellite channels and a growing assortment of Iraqi stations. “These people had nothing and now they are overwhelmed with satellite channels. It is a chance to get back to the real world,” says Alsumaria’s general manager Jean-Claude Boulos.
Established and would-be broadcasters are scrambling to get involved in the new market. Over 30 terrestrial and satellite TV channels are now on air in Iraq and over 20 TV license applications are pending.
Indeed, faced with a near anarchical security situation, environmental and infrastructural damage too depressing to think about, and rampant unemployment, Iraq’s flourishing media may be considered one of the few positive developments since the invasion. “We don’t have any form of censorship. At this point in time, Iraq is the freest country in the Arab world for the media,” asserts Faisal Al Yasiri, founder and CEO of satellite entertainment channel Al Diyar. But on the other hand Al Jazeera has been banned from operating in Iraq for well over a year, raising questions about press freedoms and the backing of many channels by governmental, religious and political groups. On top of this, and despite the allure of millions of potential viewers and consumers, broadcasting in Iraq is far from easy. Some channels are spending up to 20 percent of their monthly budgets to protect personnel, employees are regularly unable to show up at work, equipment is at risk from theft, and filming outside of studios can prove deadly.
Channels galore
Freedom, as the saying goes, comes at a price. And one of those costs for Iraqis, somewhat ironically, is too much choice on the box. “Currently Iraqis are coming out of a coma, and people don’t know what is hitting them. I don’t think it matters now, but in a year or so people will become choosy,” says Al Saraf. Judging by viewing statistics, Iraqis are increasingly exercising their rights as consumers, with around a dozen major channels grabbing viewers’ attention.
The satellite channel with the greatest reach in Iraq, according to a June Ipsos-Stat poll, is the Saudi-owned news channel Al Arabiya with 41 percent reach, followed by private Iraqi satellite channel Al Sharqiya (The East) at 40 percent.
 Al Sharqiya, Iraq’s first private satellite channel, was established by Iraqi entrepreneur Saad Al Bazzaz. The channel was mockingly known when it launched as Al Baathiya because of Al Bazzaz’s personal history. He was the head of the Baath regime’s national news agency and state TV and radio organizations until 1992, when he left following a disagreement over the invasion of Kuwait. As for channels like Alsumaria, Al Diyar and Ashur, Al Sharqiyah’s popularity stems from entertainment, current affairs and comedy programs, which Iraqis are only too happy to tune into to escape the daily trials of life. Alsumaria’s Iraq Star, a version of the much copied music show Pop Idol, was one of the most widely watched programs this year at 60 percent viewer-ship, according to an Iraqi newspaper. But due to the security situation and the lack of modern studio facilities in Iraq the final was held at Alsumaria’s studios in Beirut at the end of December. “We thought it would give more glamour for these people to come here, and they love it because being in Beirut is a lifetime experience as they had never left Iraq,” says general manager Jean-Claude Boulos.
The dire security situation is not only forcing networks to relocate shows or base operations out of neighboring countries like Dubai or Lebanon, but is also pushing up operating costs.
William Warda, the general director of Ashur TV, says that 15 to 20 percent of the channel’s monthly budget is being spent on security related issues and hiring around 60 security guards. “We provide employees with different cars to take them to and from their houses, and we pay everyone more for the risk,” he told MEB.
Faisal Al Yasiri, manager of Al Diyar TV (The Homeland), says that on average 40 percent of his employees don’t show up at work everyday. “It is a big problem to protect offices and studios - we have six people with machine guns,” he says.
Al Saraf says that as no insurance companies are willing to insure his network he is spending seven to 10 percent of his budget to secure staff, management and equipment.
It is not only violence towards employees that concerns Al Saraf, but theft. “A man approached one of my employees earlier this year and offered him the Abu Dhabi TV OB van full of computers – It was all stolen equipment!”
Al Saraf says the situation has limited the movements of camera crews, who are not only concerned with bombings and kidnappings but being approached by members of the Iraqi resistance asking for cameramen’s’ details to contact them about operations. “You always have to be on guard and vigilant in Iraq. That is the job of the journalist, living on the edge,” he says. Such hazardous conditions have taken a great toll on the media. Over 100 media workers, mainly Iraqis, have been killed since the invasion, and dozens have been imprisoned by the Coalition and Iraqi authorities.
“Everyday when I ask my guys to do a story it is a nightmare for me because I am worried what will happen,” says Nabil Al Khatib, executive editor at Al Arabiya. “I have already lost eight employees. This is in the back of the mind of each and every editor in every newsroom in the world who has correspondents in Iraq.” Furthermore, Al Khatib says, this is having an effect on coverage. “I still claim, personally, that covering Iraq is a failure for all the networks, for different reasons. It has to do with security and the danger of working there.”
Out with the old
Governments led the way in establishing Iraq-orientated TV channels in the post-Saddam Hussein era. One of the first channels to start broadcasting with an Iraqi audience in mind was the Iranian-government backed satellite TV network Al Alam (The World), which was launched during the invasion. The channel broadcasts throughout the Middle East (bureaus in Tehran, Baghdad and Beirut) but has given special focus to Iraq by hiring anchors and reporters with an Iraqi dialect or accent. “The reason for this is very simple actually, Iran is next door to Iraq,” said Faysal Abdel Sater, director of PR at Al Alam.
One of Al Alam’s stated objectives is to “end the long-held monopoly of Western media in broadcasting news.” But alongside Al Alam and pan-Arab satellite news giants Al Jazeera and Al Arabiya beaming into Iraq, Western powers were quick to replace one state broadcaster with another.
Once the Coalition Forces controlled Baghdad, the USA’s Arabic language station Radio Sawa started broadcasting along with Voice of America Kurdish and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Arabic, known as Radio Free Iraq. In March 2003 the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) created the Iraqi Media Network (IMN), with the aim of establishing a public broadcaster similar to that of the BBC and America’s PBS. Around $226 million has since been thrown at the network, which consists of 24-hour news channel Al Iraqiyah, an entertainment channel, and two FM radio stations, but has struggled to gain the credibility it set out to achieve. The network, Al Iraqiyah in particular, rapidly garnered a reputation among Iraqis as the voice of the occupying forces, largely due to its close relations with the CPA and a weekly address by US Administrator Paul Bremer. And despite the huge amounts of money provided to contractors, little was trickling down to cameramen and journalists, who were kept on pre-war salaries of $120 a month rather than the $800 a month Western networks offered or a $1000 a month private stations were reportedly paying reporters, former IMN consultant Gordon Robison wrote on the Stanhope Center’s website. But after initial teething problems Al Iraqiyah started gaining ground, with 50 percent of Iraqis interviewed in a February 2004 poll by Oxford Research International expressing confidence in the channel, up 11 points from November 2003. Alsumaria’s Boulos says Al Iraqiyah is now the most viewed terrestrial channel, largely because it is broadcast terrestrially and available to 93 percent of Iraqis. But the supposed impartiality of US-backed media has once again come under scrutiny following revelations in December that the Pentagon was secretly feeding positive news stories, written by American troops, to the Iraqi press.
The Iraqi Media Network was not the United States’ only attempt to counteract the popularity of pan-Arab news channels in Iraq, or around the rest of the region for that matter. In February, 2004 Alhurra was established, and shortly after, in April, sister channel Alhurra Iraq started broadcasting. Alhurra has had moderate success around the region, but reached into only 15 percent of Iraqi households in June according to Ipsos-Stat.
Britain’s BBC World Service Trust joined the fray fairly late, launching Al Mirbad TV and radio in August 2005 in southern Iraq. According to Abir Awad, a project developer for the World Service Trust, the channel is to provide independent media in southern Iraq. “The media in Iraq used to be very Baghdad centric so we aimed at a regional audience,” she said.
The World Service Trust is an independent charity within the World Service that has developed media in other war-torn countries such as Kosovo and Afghanistan. The British government’s Department for International Development is providing Al Mirbad with $11.81 million for the next two years, after which the broadcaster will seek funding from international donors and advertisers. The channel, managed by Iraqis, currently produces three hours of original content a day.
Fair game?
To regulate and license media and telecommunications in the new Iraq the Coalition established the Iraqi Communications and Media Commission in March 2004. It did not take long for the commission, closely modeled on the US Federal Communications Commission and the UK communications’ regulator Ofcom, to show its teeth.
Pan-Arab news networks Al Arabiya and Al Jazeera were banned from operating in Iraq for a month in August 2004 for “incitement to hatred” after broadcasting stories on the Iraqi resistance. Al Arabiya was back on air in Iraq after a month, but Al Jazeera has remained on the black list ever since.
“It was a joint US-Iraqi decision. If they wanted to have reversed that decision they could have,” says Al Jazeera’s editor in chief Ahmed Al Sheikh. The ban is nothing overly new for Al Jazeera though, which is currently banned in Iran, and has been banned in the past in Jordan, Kuwait and Palestine. Iraq however is one of the major news stories in the region, and not being there has affected not only the network’s coverage but also the channel’s reputation with Iraqis.
“Al Jazeera is still very popular [in Iraq] but not being in the place, not covering it ourselves, that has an affect on our work and viewers,” says Al Jazeera presenter and producer Mohammed Al Bouniry. “I think the people behind the closure are those who don’t like the truth, no more, no less. They don’t like Al Jazeera,” he adds. “By shutting down Al Jazeera they will have no problem to shut others down.” International media watchdogs have jumped to the same conclusion, with Reporters Without Borders calling the decision "a serious blow to press freedom."
But such concerns about the commission are not widely echoed by other broadcasters. The commission was welcomed by many stations and Pierre Daher, the head of LBC, which was involved in training media staff at Al Iraqiyah for six months in 2005, says he believes the  commission is a sign of democracy. However, some broadcasters do see certain shortcomings with the commission. “I think it is a first for the Arab World. It could be bigger and wider, and just revolves around one person. It has not successfully tackled issues in media bias, such as during the elections,” says Saad Al Saraf, founder and manager of the upcoming entertainment-orientated Iraqi Star TV Network.
For the World Service Trust’s Al Mirbad the commission’s guidelines were supplemented through internal editorial guidelines. “It is fine for regulating media in a country, but as a responsible broadcaster you need to take responsibility for your coverage and sources,” says Awad.
Advertising and survival
The security situation is not only driving up overheads, but also biting into much needed advertising revenue. “We have a big problem of not enough advertising to finance the channel. We have some, especially political advertising, but we hope the situation will settle and we can survive on commercial advertisement,” says Al Diyar’s Al Yasiri.
With adverting revenues unpredictable and employees demanding higher wages for the dangers they face in the field, certain channels are struggling to keep good employees. “Some channels have more money to pay for cameramen, so employees leave and go to other channels. It is a problem,” says Al Yasiri.
Some channels are faring reasonably well from the Iraqi advertising market. According to Saad Al Saraf over half of Al Arabiya’s advertising revenue comes from Iraq. Al Arabiya’s Jihad Ballout considers the figure an exaggeration, but admits that during the recent elections there were “heavy bursts” of public awareness campaigns and political advertising from Iraq.
Other channels are looking to the long-term to generate revenue. Pan-Arab satellite channel Arab News Broadcast (ANB) was launched in June 2004 with the fledgling Iraqi market specifically in mind. “Iraq is a big country with a big future,” asserts ANB’s Chairman Boutros El Khoury. Alsumaria is also hopeful about Iraq’s future, expecting a return on investment within three to four years. “Already major brands are establishing themselves in Iraq and this means that very soon, advertising and large communication campaigns are going to follow,” Alsumaria told MEB.
Al Saraf’s Iraqi Star TV Network is not taking any risks with advertising however. Al Saraf also manages advertising agency Arab Star Advertising, which has carried out campaigns for the Iraqi Police on TV and radio. He believes this partnership will give his TV channels a much needed competitive advantage. “This unique combination is vital because in Iraq you have political parties or wannabe media tycoons setting up channels. There is a lack of knowledge of advertising and generating revenue. It is not only an Iraqi phenomena but an Arab one. You cannot rely on being funded by a fat check book from the Gulf,” he says.
Other channels are circumventing the advertising conundrum through funding from religious and political parties. Al Salam TV relies on funding from Shiite cleric Imam al Sadr, Al Nahrain TV and Ghadeer TV on the Higher Council of the Islamic Revolution, Al Masar TV on the Islamic Da'awa Party, and Ahlul Bayt TV on the patronage of Shiite cleric Ayatollah Hadi Al-Moderassi. Ashur TV, which represents the Assyrian Democratic Movement, receives 50 percent of its funding from the party, and the rest from supporters around the world to balance the books.
But will all these new TV channels last? The politically backed channels have a more secure source of income than the commercial channels, but consolidation across Iraq’s fragmented media landscape is perhaps inevitable as competition increases, not only within Iraq, but from pan-Arab and international channels.
Alsumaria said one of the reasons the Iraqi government is concerned with implementing rules and regulations is to limit the number of channels mushrooming throughout the country. Others think the number of channels will decrease as a result of market forces. “People are voting with their remote controls. And those channels without good content are going to lose out,” says Al Sarraf. “I think we are going to see channels disappearing over the next year. This is usual in a new market and will stabilize as there is not enough revenue.” Nevertheless, market forces have had a minimal impact on forcing the closure of TV channels. The withdrawal of financial and/or political backing are the oft-cited reasons for channels pulling the plug, but the limited advertising revenue throughout the Middle East will eventually take its toll in Iraq, as much as elsewhere in the Arab World. Ashur TV’s Warda, for instance, believes there will be a decline in channels for a number of reasons. “It will not continue as it is. Channels will stop because of money problems, fines and a lack of good programs,” he says.
Although the Iraqi market is likely to see more channels being launched, broadcasting will continue to be a struggle in the absence of stability. And in the short term at least, funding for channels is likely to remain primarily in the hands of political and religious groups rather than the commercial sector.
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