A religious channel, Loveworld Television Network, owned by Nigerian Pastor, Chris Oyakhilome, has been sanctioned by the Office of Communications in the United Kingdom (Ofcom) for breach of broadcasting code.
The channel was fined £125,000 (N65.6 million) by Ofcom for providing inaccurate and potentially harmful claims about the coronavirus disease without providing adequate protection for viewers.
This disclosure is contained in a statement issued by Ofcom on Wednesday, March 31, 2021, pointing out that this was the second time in a year that they breached their rules on accuracy in the news.
Ofcom considered these breaches to be serious, repeated and reckless, warranting the imposition of a statutory sanction beyond the direction to broadcast a statement of our findings that Ofcom issued in its decision published on January 15, 2021.
▪︎What the Office of Communications in the UK is saying
The statement from Ofcom partly reads, “Today we have fined Loveworld £125,000 for this breach of the broadcasting code. This was the second time in a year that the broadcaster breached our rules on accuracy in news and harm in its coverage of the coronavirus.’’
Ofcom said that its investigation found that Loveworld aired a 29-hour programme called the Global Day of Prayer, during which claims were made about the Covid-19.
These claims included statements that the pandemic was a planned event created by the deep state for nefarious purposes and that the vaccine is a sinister means of administering nanochips to control and harm people.
Some statements
claimed that “fraudulent”
testing had been carried out to deceive the public about the existence of the virus and the scale of the pandemic. Others linked the cause of Covid-19 to the rollout of 5G technology.
Ofcom said it was unfortunate that the station could continue to spread such information despite previous warnings.
The statement further read: “Ofcom stresses that legitimate debate about the official response to the coronavirus pandemic is fundamental to holding public authorities to account during a global health crisis - particularly when public freedoms are curtailed and complex policy decisions are being taken.
“However, the inaccurate and potentially harmful claims made during this programme were unsupported by any factual evidence and went entirely without challenge.’’
Going further, Ofcom said it was particularly concerned that this breach followed previous, similar breaches in 2020 during the investigation of which, Loveworld Limited gave a number of assurances as to how it would improve its compliance procedures.
It is significant to know that Oyakhilome, who is the founder of Christ Embassy church, with headquarters in Lagos, has been a well-known critic of the coronavirus disease which has ravaged the world economy and disrupted lives and businesses.
He has been reported to have encouraged members of his church to ignore Covid-19 protocols and recently asked them not to take the Covid-19 vaccines.
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