More at ease with RJRGleaner merger

THE EDITOR, Sir: AS A Gleaner stakeholder and long-time reader and as a watcher of TVJ news and Dionne Jackson Miller and some other programmes most nights, I am paying close attention to the proposed RJR-Gleaner merger.

After reading Kay Osborne’s well-balanced, thoughtful and comprehensive analysis (‘Why media ownership matters’, Sunday Gleaner, August 18, 2015) of the situation, paying particular attention to the competitive structural information that big conglomerates are also now inside of the media business, I can now see why the merger is a necessity. I feel better about it and I have gone from being sceptical about it to supporting it.

Considering that the big, foreign-owned telecommunications companies, including one that is privately owned, could someday soon be the ones to be bringing Jamaicans our daily share of news and current affairs information every day is among this country’s worst nightmares.

Blessings to the Gleaner and RJR families who have served Jamaica so well for so long. May the merger work out for your betterment and the betterment of Jamaica! Naturally, the merger will bring some fallout, but, hopefully, too many people will not lose out.

Thanks to Ms Osborne. Jamaica needs more intelligent and balanced voices like hers. DERRICK EDWARDS derry2847JN@yahoo.com