The Daily Star, Lebanon
May 10 2008

Opposition gunmen seize control of Hariri’s media empire
By Agence France Presse (AFP)

Saturday, May 10, 2008

BEIRUT: Militants allied with the opposition on Friday forced the
shutdown of all media operations belonging to the family of majority
leader and billionaire tycoon Saad Hariri.

The closure – which came as opposition fighters routed Sunni loyalists
of the government – concerned one satellite news channel, two regular
television stations, a newspaper and a radio station.

The media empire which was launched by Hariri’s father, Rafik Hariri,
the billionaire former prime minister who was assassinated in February
2005 in a massive Beirut seafront car bombing. The slain former Prime
Minister rose from humble beginnings to command an empire that
included flagship construction company Saudi-Oger, real estate
developer Solidere, banks and other companies – turning everything he
touched into gold.

His business activities and his rise as an influential Middle East
political leader often won the elder Hariri comparisons with Italy’s
billionaire politician Silvio Berslusconi who also sits atop a huge
business and media empire.

Future Television was launched in February 1993 at the height of
Lebanon’s post-war reconstruction frenzy, when Hariri was also busy in
multi-billion-dollar ventures to rebuild Beirut’s war-devastated city
center.

The guns of the 1975-1990 Civil War had gone silent only three years
earlier and the new high-tech television offered a wide scope of
family programmes, variety shows as well as news.

In 1994 Future Television launched a trial satellite broadcasting –
Future International – that also proved very popular with Arab
audiences.

In less than a year, Future International grew to become one of the
leading Arab satellite stations gathering the highest audience ratings
in the Gulf, Egypt and the Levant," according to Future Television Web
site.

"Like Future Television, Future International is a family TV that
promotes Lebanon as a place for reconstruction, civilization,
prosperity, coexistence, fun and good times."

Future Television restructured its ownership in 1996 and "now has
around 90 new shareholders, all from the Lebanese business, social and
media elite."

That same year it set up a Web site on the Internet, the first by a
Lebanese television.

The television expanded yet again in December 2007 when it launched
Future News, a 24/hour, which broadcasts news in Turkish and Armenian
as well as Arabic, English and French.

The Hariri family also moved into radio in February 1995, setting up
Radio Orient which began broadcasting from Beirut before moving onto a
new base in Paris.

Like the television, Radio Orient focuses on news from and about the
Arab world, and Lebanon in particular, broadcasting in English and
French as well as Arabic.

Al-Mustaqbal newspaper was also founded in 1995 and continues to serve
as the mouthpiece of Hariri’s Future movement. – AFP