Mediacritica

The presumption of innocence is guaranteed by the Republic of Moldova Constitution which provides that every person charged with a criminal offence should be presumed innocent, until proved guilty following a fair public trial, where the charged shall be provided with all guarantees necessary for his defense”.
 
The presumption of innocence, besides being a legal norm, is a journalistic professional norm. Therefore, the Journalist’s Deontology Code of the Republic of Moldova provides: “the journalist observes the presumption of innocence and presumes every person to be innocent until a final and irrevocable verdict is issued. However, reading what many journalists write, we can see that rules were made to be violated.

Rodica MAHU,
Editor, Jurnal de Chișinău

Tatiana CORAI, ”Media Azi” editor

On Thursday, October 15, the Parliament of the Republic of Moldova, unanimously voted to lift the immunity of former prime minister and leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Moldova (LDPM) Parliamentary fraction, Vlad Filat, based upon a motion by the Prosecutor General. The LDPM MP has later been detained by NAC agents for 72 hours.

On Sunday, after the regular detention period expired and following a hearing that lasted for more than 6 hours, the court ruled that the former prime minister would be detained for 30 days.

How much professionalism did the press apply in this case? We refer here to the press in general and also to the press with an "anti - Filat” reputation.

Properly performed opinion surveys are necessary. These can, for example, reveal the situation in the society at a given time, can identify certain trends, suggest intervention measures to maintain the social balance etc. The bad thing is that we cannot always check if a survey is carried out properly. Much worse is that we usually find out about the results of the surveys from the media, which most of the time present them in a distorted manner.

The entire beauty and ugliness of the world appeared today on Facebook accounts from Romania, proving the huge power of this environment, which we usually disregard.

The fire occurred on October 30 at Colectiv Club in Bucharest killed, until now, 32 young people and caused other 140 victims. The tragedy shook Romania and put it to test in various ways. It tested its health system, its emergency system, the management capacity of civil authorities, and the piety of church authorities. But, most important, it tested the citizens’ humanity and solidarity, as well as their ability to care about other people. The fire occurred on Friday night, when televisions have ended their news programmes and were preparing for the weekend Halloween parties and entertainments.

- What brings you here? Asked the waitress from the restaurant of the hotel from Bistrita. I told the woman that we intend to organize media literacy training courses with high school students from the city - to teach them to understand mass media and to make a difference between quality journalism and entertainment, as well as to recognize manipulation.
- Are you organizing such courses only for children?
- For whom else should we organize them? I asked.
- For people like me, the waitress answered promptly, pointing both hands at her chest, to reinforce her identity.
It was for the first time when such a clear and specifically formulated request came “from the people”: we need such courses to understand mass media. Almost two years have gone by since that dialog and I still owe that woman a course.