The Senate has urged the Federal Government to immortalise the late Founder of DAAR Communications Plc, High Chief Raymond Dokpesi.
The Senate resolutions followed a Point of Order raised by Senator Francis Alimikhena (PDP Edo) at plenary on Wednesday.
The lawmaker, who read the late Dokpesi’s profile, recalled that the media entrepreneur’s first business, Africa Ocean Lines, was the first indigenous shipping line in Africa.
Although the business did not last long, Senator Alimikhena noted that it contributed to the Nigerian shipping industry just as his media company.
“It helped to formulate the Nigerian Shipping Act Decree 1986, which stated the sharing formula of 40:20:20 for cargo between developed and developing countries,” the Edo lawmaker said.
“In the early 1990s, when Nigerian media was dominated by the government media only, he entered the mass media industry with his company, DAAR Communications,” he added.
Alimikhena noted that Dokpesi established the first independent radio station, RayPower FM, in 1993, and the first global satellite television station, Africa Independent Television (AIT) in Nigeria, in 1996.
Similarly, Eyinnaya Abaribe (APGA Abia) described the AIT founder as a trailblazer who pioneered private radio and television stations in the country.
“We must at all times always remember the late Dokpesi as the man that stood forward for Nigeria and gave us one of the key ingredient of democracy which is freedom of information,” Abaribe added.
Dokpesi died on Monday, May 29, 2023, after a brief illness.
