SCJ Put an End to PD Video Spots ‘Saga’, Ordering Jurnal TV to Broadcast the Party’s Videos

The Supreme Court of Justice (SCJ) rejected, by its decision of 11 February, the appeal lodged by Jurnal TV and upheld the last decision of Court of Appeal of 7 February, which ordered the channel to broadcast the Democratic Party’s (PD) electoral spots regarding the consultative referendum of 24 February. The SCJ resolution is irrevocable.
Note that previously the channel refused to broadcast the spots because they allegedly advertise for PD. In response, PD sued Jurnal TV and the case went through the Court of Appeal, which ruled in favor of the party. Jurnal TV filed an appeal to the Supreme Court of Justice, which returned the case to the Court of Appeal for reconsideration.
According to the last Court of Appeal decision of 7 February, Jurnal TV must broadcast the PD spots and, as a compensation for refusing to broadcast them in time, it will have to broadcast 2 minutes of paid advertising per day, during 7 days, starting with 7 February 2019.

Jurnal TV Was Fined for the Moderator’s Aggressive Language
The Broadcasting Council (BC) fined Jurnal TV with MDL 5,000 for accusing many people and institutions, without requesting their opinion in ‘60 minutes with Vasile Nastase’ show of 1 February. The decision was made after the BC monitored the broadcaster, following the notification by Democratic Party (PD).
PD representatives claimed that although only Sergiu Litvinenco, representative of the ‘Acum - DA Platform and PAS’ Electoral Bloc was invited, the discussions focused particularly on the Democratic Party and its election candidates. PD said that television broadcaster violated its own editorial policy for the election campaign and requested to sanction it.
Monitoring results showed that many topics were addressed during the show, such as: the first applications for citizenship through investments (Ilan Sor’s wife, Sara Sor, her father and brother); intimidation of some candidates of the ‘ACUM’ Election Bloc; the case of Gheorghe Petic. Concurrently, BC monitoring found that show moderator Vasile Nastase used an aggressive and biased language during the show, accusing seriously many people and institutions without showing their position.
Jurnal TV representatives asked to postpone the case review for another day, arguing that they did not have enough time for fact-finding. BC rejected this request and, as it was not the first violation, Jurnal TV was fined with MDL 5,000, according to Article 13 of the Audiovisual Media Services Code.
The TV channel was also obliged to broadcast the text of the BC decision within 48 hours from the adoption date, in audio and/or video format, at least 3 times in the prime time, of which once in the main newscast program in case of generalist and/or news audiovisual media services.
The sanctioned media services provider may appeal the BC decision in the court.