OTTAWA – The Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage has decided to invite representatives from Rogers Media to explain recent cutbacks made to the news programming at its multicultural OMNI TV stations.
According to the minutes of Monday’s committee meeting which were made public today, the committee will “invite representatives from OMNI to discuss their recent programming changes, specifically as they relate to local news coverage in Punjabi, Cantonese, Mandarin and Italian; and that the meeting take place prior to Thursday, June 18, 2015, and that the meeting be scheduled for 2 hours.”
As Cartt.ca reported less than a month ago, Rogers Media eliminated all of its third-language newscasts on its various OMNI stations, citing high costs and low revenue for the programming. OMNI’s Punjabi, Cantonese and Mandarin newscasts are being replaced by local current affairs shows in B.C. and Ontario while its Italian-language news disappeared altogether and has been replaced by an imported Italian-language novella.
More to come.
