28 March 2024, Thursday, 17:31
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Nobody sees Belsat

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Emergence of a satellite TV channel independent from the regime was long-awaited in Belarus. And not long ago Poles managed to create and launch such a channel. However, just a few people in Belarus saw it. Gradually people get nervous and start writing worried letters.

Andrzej Pisalnik, a correspondent of a Polish newspaper Rzeczpospolita in Moscow, even started a discussion in his blog, whether Polish money earmarked by the state are spent for the TV channel for Belarusians efficiently. At the web-page of Belsat one of the dwellers of Belarus nicknamed as “an unknown aerial expert”, started several topics for discussing the technical side of the problem. An expert in aerials installation even addressed an open letter to the leader of “For Freedom” movement Alyaksandr Milinkevich. He hopes that Milinkevich and other Belarusian politicians would influence their Polish colleagues and make them take some steps. The letter of the “Unknown aerial expert” was published by “Belarusian partisan”:

“For more than 6 years my business is retail and wholesale trade in satellite systems.

I had been waiting for launching a satellite TV channel for 2 years. I installed aerials for clients to standard positions (sirius, hotbird, amos). I couldn’t even suppose that Belsat would broadcast at other satellites. It caused shock among people familiar with the problem, including me.

The majority of people certainly expect that Belsat would switch to another, more easily accessible satellite, but there are people who are trying to pretend that everything is alright, and that persistent people can watch the channel from Astra satellite perfectly well.

Let’s suppose that there are 500,000 satellite dishes in Belarus. 70% of them are tuned to standard positions: sirius, hotbird, amos. A potential number of Belsat viewers is about 300,000 households, or about 1 mln people. The number of such satellite systems grows by 3,000 a month.

And Belsat is broadcast from Astra 19 E satellite. As there are no Russian-language channels at this satellite, the number of clients can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Is it accidentally or not, but the satellite has been chosen in such a way that Belarusians would not see it. Astra is widely used by Germans, Poles and other Europeans, that is why they think Belarusians use it too.

Carrying the channel by Sirius would be ideal (it carries 6 Russian and 9 Ukrainian channels), or Hotbird (16 Russian and Russian-language channels, including “Voice of America”, “Radio Liberty”, 600 free foreign channels), or at least Amos (134 Ukrainian channels). If this grassroots protest won’t turn into a scandal, and everything would remain the same, this project would remain just an ideological scarecrow for Lukashenka. Possibly someone is trying to use it as an argument in talks with the official Minsk.

Over the recent month the regime has opened a real hunt on those who are engaged in satellite dishes business. In January the largest company importing systems Tricolor and NTV Plus, General Satellite, was in fact made bankrupt. A news item was demonstrated as police allegedly found goods for $350,000 in a cottage. Opposition and other external enemies were mentioned for some reason. And in reality, that company was a manufacturer of a wide range of receivers, a co-owner of Tricolor system, which is more popular in Russia than NTV Plus. The owner of the firm was soon found and imprisoned. Inspections frequented to the firm, and the company was made bankrupt. Recently, in March, one more seller of satellite equipment was arrested. Sweeping attacks of the state on this sphere of business which previously interested no one are obvious. The potential influence of an independent TV channel from an accessible satellite is too great.

The world is changing rapidly, and hundreds thousands people come home tired after work and switch on TV sets with satellite receivers, in order to take mind off everyday madness. They do not have time to wait several internet pages to be loaded. They do not have normal Internet at home, basically.

I do not sign my letter as it is dangerous for my business and my family. I am an unknown satellite aerials expert”.

The letter of the unknown satellite dishes expert is published because hundred thousands Belarusians had been waiting for launching of the TV channel. The TV channel has been broadcasting just several months, and people are patiently giving it a chance to start off and get promotion. Representatives of Belsat say that they negotiate with the owner of Sirius satellite, SES Sirius company. It is very expensive to rent a satellite, but it is even more expensive to spend hundreds thousands dollars and work for no one.

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