It’s official: Don Imus is coming back to the airwaves.
As The Post first reported back in August, radio’s lone cowboy is expected to announce this afternoon or, at the latest tomorrow morning, that he has sealed a deal with Farid Suleman’s Citadel Communications to host a morning talk-show on the company’s flagship WABC station in New York, unseating the incumbent, highly rated “Curtis and Kuby” show.
While Imus will begin his return on that station alone-just six short months after being universally ostracized for calling the Rutgers University women’s basketball team “nappy-headed hos”–a source involved with the deal said it is “more likely than not” that the radio raconteur will eventually be syndicated across ABC Radio’s 22 stations.
This source said that Imus signed a 5-year deal with Citadel that pays him between $5 million and $8 million annually.
Plans call for Imus’ first show back to be broadcast on December 3, and while there had been talks about doing the show from a special remote location, the source said that has been shelved in favor of a traditional broadcast.
Imus is also in talks on a separate television deal akin to the one he had with MSNBC though the source was unsure if those negotiations would be wrapped up in time to announce a deal simultaneous with the Citadal one.
Among the television stations talking with Imus about a deal is RFD-TV, a farming-focused satellite television network that was previously granted exclusive access to Imus’ ranch for a documentary that aired over Labor Day weekend.
Citadel Communications CEO Farid Suleman did not return a call for comment earlier today.
But in a previous interview with The Post back in August, the 54 year-old Tanzanian said that he thought Imus’ availability represented an opportunity and that he would consider hiring him only if he could make the numbers work.
Such modesty belies the “can’t lose” proposition that bringing Imus back is for Suleman. If the shock jock flames out in his return, Suleman can point to Imus’ comments about the Rutgers University women’s basketball team as having tarnished him forever. If the public embraces Imus’ second act, Suleman will earn kudos for giving him another chance.
The Rutgers controversy made Imus the object of vitriol from liberal leaders such as Sen. Hillary Clinton and the Rev. Al Sharpton. Clinton even referred to Imus as “Satan” – and called his remarks “small-minded bigotry.”
But Suleman is no stranger to controversial radio hosts and industry observers said he has the ego to absorb the scrutiny that will come with shepherding Imus back onto the air. To be sure, Suleman and his former Infinity and Westwood One cohort Joel Hollander were responsible for putting Fox News host Bill O’Reilly on the radio and bringing back Marv Albert to call “Monday Night Football” games after he was accused of biting a sex partner in 1997.
Moreover, in August, Suleman signed a deal to return Bob Grant back to WABC-AM in New York after 11 years in exile for comments he made about Commerce Secretary Ron Brown following the fatal crash of Brown’s plane.
According to the source, Suleman has no plans to reach out to the African-American community or the Rutgers University women’s basketball team prior to or after Imus’ return.