SPACE RACE FOR ALBERT FRERE
If the Ariane IV space rocket, rising from its jungle launch pad in French Guiana next year, blows up in mid-air like this year’s model, it may be blowing up the latest ambition of Albert Frere.
The Belgian banker and former steel magnate, who commutes between Brussels and Luxembourg by executive jet, has some prospect of becoming the TV supremo of Europe. He is (through a roundabout holding system) the biggest shareholder in the Compagnie Luxembourgeoise de Telediffusion (CLT).
Just as, in 1929, Luxembourg outraged the British Broadcasting Corporation by Broadcasting radio advertisements in English, interspersed with programmes far more popular than the BBC’s, it has recently outraged the French by a proposal to make its commercial TV programmes visible by satellite, not just in northern France, but all over Europe.
The satellite project, known as Astra, has been initiated by the Luxembourg Government, not by CLT.
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