Duprès, Louange team up to capture public’s expectations |11 August 2017

Presentation of instruments of appointment to SBC’s new CEO and DCEO

 Bérard Duprès and Jude Louange will lead the Seychelles Broadcasting Corporation as chief executive and deputy chief executive for the next five years starting yesterday and their main objective is to capture the public’s expectations.

They received their instruments of appointment from President Danny Faure yesterday morning in a short ceremony at State House in the presence of Vice-President Vincent Meriton, Designated Minister Macsuzy Mondon, president of the Seychelles Court of Appeal Francis McGregor, members of the Constitutional Appointments Authority, secretaries of state, members of the Seychelles Broadcasting Corporation (SBC) board and guests.

The appointments of Mr Duprès as chief executive and Mr Louange as deputy chief executive were recommended to the president by the SBC board, and the president consulted with National Assembly Speaker Patrick Pillay and the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court Mathilda Twomey, as required by the SBC Act, before making the appointments, as per Section 5 (3) of the SBC Act 2011.

Altogether there were nine applicants for the post of chief executive and six for the post of deputy chief executive and they were all interviewed by the board before the members unanimously chose Messrs Duprès and Louange.

A chartered engineer and a chartered manager with several years of experience in managing radio transmitting stations for the BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation), Mr Duprès has a Bachelor of Engineering degree from the University of Bath in the UK, where he studied telecommunications and electronic engineering.

He is a member of the Institute of Engineering and Technology (UK) and also a member of the Chartered Management Institute (UK).

Since June 2016, Mr Duprès had been the corporate services manager at the British high commission in Victoria, but prior to this, he was the senior local manager at the BBC Atlantic Relay Station on Ascension Island in the South Atlantic. He also served in the post of manager of the BBC Indian Ocean Relay Transmitting Station, at Grand Anse Mahé. He was the first non-British national to be appointed to these roles. Mr Duprès also administered two radio transmitting stations in the United Arab Emirates, concurrently with the Seychelles’ role.

As for Mr Louange, he is a qualified journalist, radio and television producer.

Boasting a Master of Arts in Communications Studies from the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom and a Bachelor of the Arts with honours degree in Media Production from the University of Bournemouth in the United Kingdom, Mr Louange joined the department of information in January 1983 as a reporter where he produced news dispatches for the then Seychelles Agence Press and the Seychelles NATION newspaper.

He was transferred to Radio Television Seychelles (RTS) in 1988 where he joined the television newsroom and later the television production section. Mr Louange headed the television production section at the Seychelles Broadcasting Corporation (SBC) from 2003 until 2008 when he was appointed radio programmes manager. Three years later, he moved back to television production where he hosted the popular Breakfast Show Bonzour Sesel.

When asked by the local media about his plans for SBC, Mr Duprès said “before doing a plan you need to consult all your stakeholders on how you are going to go forward”.

He added: “We are not starting anew as there is already an SBC and a team. There has been a change and this is not necessarily a frightening thing. If we believe in continuous improvement and strive for excellence, I think it will be a gradual raising of some of the standards and see where we can improve on, listen to what the audience is telling us because they are our customers. We also need to find ways to be a little more attuned and get a bit more feedback so that we can improve ourselves.”

Mr Duprès added that many stakeholders are interested in the SBC and they include politicians and the general public who are the tax payers paying for SBC.

“So, there is a lot of expectations and we need to capture these expectations and see how we can validate, implement them where it is valid, and see where we can get a consensus into some of the other bigger issues,” noted the new SBC chief executive who has replaced Antoine Onezime who took up the post on September 2, 2009.

As for Mr Louange he said he is very happy on being appointed SBC’s deputy CEO, adding that himself, CEO Duprès and the board members will be meeting very soon to work on the new strategy.

Having worked for SBC for 35 years, Mr Louange explained that his “years of experience speaks for itself”.

He added that “right now expectations are high, all eyes are on us and people want us to deliver. They want us to give them local content and one of my objectives is to give back to SBC its public purpose. Whatever we do, whatever we film, and whatever we have on the radio, each and every Seychellois must identify him or herself with what we are doing. Our journalists, presenters and producers should think of our people first when working on content. It’s a big challenge and a bigger challenge because Seychelles is changing and we need to go along with the changes that are happening in the country”.

Having worked for SBC for 35 years, Mr Louange explained that his “years of experience speaks for itself”, and pointed out that “in the past, one of the biggest critics of SBC, which has somewhat tarnished its image, is we were not living to what the Constitution was asking us to do and that impacted negatively on our output”.

“We will do our best. We don’t have a magic wand. We will get everyone including the staff on board. I’m optimistic for the future. We cannot bring SBC to the height we want without the staff. We have to bring everyone on board and from there strategise and get going,” he said.

Asked to comment on the independence of SBC, Mr Louange replied: “It will be a question of listening to what people are saying, give them a voice and opinion in our output”.

Giving details about the interview process, SBC board chairman Gerard Lafortune explained that included in the applications for the two posts were the curriculum vitae of the candidates and a motivation letter detailing to the board why they should be selected for these respective positions.

“The board reviewed all these applications on paper and decided to conduct an interview with every single one of the applicants, bar one applicant who was out of the country. After all the interviews were done we assessed the results, the CVs and motivation letters and their interviews, and the board was unanimous in recommending Mr Duprès as CEO and Mr Louange as deputy CEO. It was a unanimous decision with no other proposal made by any single member of the board,” stressed Mr Lafortune.

Mr Duprès, Mr Louange, and members of the SBC board with President Faure