Sangeet 106.1 listenter threatens to take action over alleged bias in political reporting

A listener to the radio station Sangeet 106.1 fm has written to the station's parent company complaining about what he calls the lack of professionalism and balance on its morning talk show hosted by Ken Ali, Suruj Rambachan and Shamoon Mohammed.

The letter by Bimal Samaroo of Montrose, Chaguanas to Brandon Khan, General Manager of the Trinidad Broadcasting Company, is prefaced by a disclaimer stating that he was acting freely and was not influenced by anyone in writing to the station.

"I have to bring to your attention what I consider to be the misuse of your airwaves during the weekly morning talk show," Samaroo wrote, noting that he has noticed a trend by the hosts of the show to allow certain regular callers to attack Chaguanas West MP Jack Warner.

"Some very degrading comments are often made by these callers without any intervention or protection from the hosts. It comes across therefore that they are silently supporting the open abuse and character assassination," Samaroo said.

He provided Khan with examples, which he said shows clearly that callers attacked Warner's ethnicity and alleged that the MP didn’t understand Hinduism and Indian culture.

"This was a very clear racial attack. At no time did any host stop him," he said.

Samaroo noted that while the hosts were silent during the instances when callers attacked Warner they aggressively defended UNC leader Basdeo Panday whenever people called to make negative comments about the former prime minister.

He quoted Rambachan, saying the former Chaguanas mayor would demand from callers evidence to support their claims and chastise them saying, “we can't tolerate you attacking a Member of Parliament."

Samaroo said, "Clearly these guys are openly supporting Basdeo Panday on the airwaves owned by a respected company like Ansa Mcal. The station must be fair and unbiased."

He urged the general manager to make sure that the shows hosts act professionally never cease the practice of allowing callers to attack the personalities and characters of others who can’t defend themselves.

"Your station is falling in my eyes...You need to set some rules for your station or you would lose your following. I intend to follow this programme for the next few weeks and to tape, as I have been doing, the recordings," Samaroo said.

"If it continues I am going to write to the Telecommunications Commission and send the tapes to them. I also intend to send the tapes and my letter to the Chairman of ANSA MCAL, Mr. Norman Sabga," he said.