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Рy06 November 2018
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On 2 October 2018, President Igor Dodon submitted the Audiovisual Media Services Code to the Parliament for reconsideration. The head of the state was dissatisfied with the provisions allowing the transmission of information, analytical, political and military broadcasts only from the member states of the European Union, the US and Canada and the states that have ratified the European Convention on Transfrontier Television. The Russian Federation is not among the countries that have ratified the European Convention on Transfrontier Television.
In his letter to Speaker Andrian Candu, published on the Deschide.md portal, Igor Dodon stated that the Code, although it aims to protect the national audiovisual space, ‘actually concentrates and monopolises the media space’. ‘Or, this raster contains only an insignificant percentage of information sources produced in those over 190 states of the world, thus limiting the domestic consumer’s access to other media products’, Igor Dodon claims.
Speaker Andrian Candu reacted to Igor Dodon’s letter via a message published on his Facebook page: ‘I have just one argument for all of these – the draft transposes for the first time into the national law the EU regulatory norms in the field and it was developed by professionals, not politicians. Freedom of the press is and will be a topic outside of the electoral context’.
In July, Igor Dodon said at a television broadcaster that he would not promulgate this law ‘neither the first nor the second time, even if I am threatened with suspension’.
The Constitution stipulates that the President of the Republic of Moldova is entitled, whenever he has certain objections regarding a law, to submit it within two weeks at the most for reconsideration.
In the case of other laws that President Dodon did not promulgate, the MPs kept their previously adopted decision, the laws being promulgated by the Speaker, after the President’s suspension by the Constitutional Court.
The draft Audiovisual Media Services Code was voted in final reading on 18 October, but the final version of the whole document has yet to be published.
As regards Igor Dodon’s statement that the new Code ‘concentrates and monopolises the media space’, note that the political party that supported Igor Dodon during the previous presidential elections and continues to support him so far, holds some media properties, recognised as the PSRM press holding. Among them are NTV Moldova, owned by socialist MP Corneliu Furculita, and Accent TV, owned by Vadim Ciubara, former representative of the Party of Socialists of the Republic of Moldova in Moscow.
In his letter to Speaker Andrian Candu, published on the Deschide.md portal, Igor Dodon stated that the Code, although it aims to protect the national audiovisual space, ‘actually concentrates and monopolises the media space’. ‘Or, this raster contains only an insignificant percentage of information sources produced in those over 190 states of the world, thus limiting the domestic consumer’s access to other media products’, Igor Dodon claims.
Speaker Andrian Candu reacted to Igor Dodon’s letter via a message published on his Facebook page: ‘I have just one argument for all of these – the draft transposes for the first time into the national law the EU regulatory norms in the field and it was developed by professionals, not politicians. Freedom of the press is and will be a topic outside of the electoral context’.
In July, Igor Dodon said at a television broadcaster that he would not promulgate this law ‘neither the first nor the second time, even if I am threatened with suspension’.
The Constitution stipulates that the President of the Republic of Moldova is entitled, whenever he has certain objections regarding a law, to submit it within two weeks at the most for reconsideration.
In the case of other laws that President Dodon did not promulgate, the MPs kept their previously adopted decision, the laws being promulgated by the Speaker, after the President’s suspension by the Constitutional Court.
The draft Audiovisual Media Services Code was voted in final reading on 18 October, but the final version of the whole document has yet to be published.
As regards Igor Dodon’s statement that the new Code ‘concentrates and monopolises the media space’, note that the political party that supported Igor Dodon during the previous presidential elections and continues to support him so far, holds some media properties, recognised as the PSRM press holding. Among them are NTV Moldova, owned by socialist MP Corneliu Furculita, and Accent TV, owned by Vadim Ciubara, former representative of the Party of Socialists of the Republic of Moldova in Moscow.
