KIGALI, March 12 (Xinhua) -- The majority of African countries failed to comply the deadline set for 2015 for migration from analogue to digital terrestrial television (DDT) broadcasting, the continental broadcasting union said on Monday.
This followed disputes between the regulators and leading broadcasters over digital signal distribution licenses and lack of affordable standard set-top boxes that convert analogue signals to digital, said Gregoire Ndjaka, CEO of the African Union of Broadcasting (AUB), in Kigali, capital city of Rwanda.
"Digital transition process has been difficult for many nations in Africa. Only a few African countries have completed the transition and many more are making the transition," he said at a continental broadcasting meeting.
Rwanda hosts the 11th general assembly and ordinary session of the AUB from March 12 to 16 dubbed "African audiovisual media and the migratory question."
The five-day meeting, which brings together stakeholders in Africa's broadcasting sector, ICT regulators and the representatives from the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), seeks to deliberate ways aimed at speeding up the process of implementing the digital migration.
The ITU set June 2015 as the global deadline for switching from analogue to DDT broadcasting that allows the introduction of additional services such as digitally-enabled TVs and pay TVs in order to improve television viewership across the globe.
We are looking at ways to speed up the implementation process because digital broadcasting has the potential to improve both the quantity and quality of what is available on TV and improve television viewership.
The meeting is also expected to review media coverage of the migration crisis in Africa and the issue of television broadcasting rights of Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) in Africa.
During last year's AFCON, only 13 countries in Africa transmitted it live due to broadcasting rights issues, according to the African Union of Broadcasting.