Media experts: BCC should ensure compliance with the law, including on the part of foreign broadcasters

“As the guarantor of the public interest, the Broadcasting Coordinating Council (BCC) should monitor not only domestic broadcast programs, but also foreign broadcast programs, and intervene where these programs contradict the legislation of the Republic of Moldova concerning provision of correct information to the public,” the Association of Independent Press (AIP) and the Independent Journalism Center (IJC) say in a letter to the BCC concerning protection of the domestic media space.

The two media organizations have spoken on this subject at the request of the BCC president Marian Pocaznoi, who appealed last week to several media NGOs to share their positions concerning the need “to take protective measures to stop Russian propaganda on the territory of Moldova” – the issue raised by the Ana Gutu, MP, in a public address to the BCC.

The AIP and IJC representatives also presented their position at the press conference organized for the presentation of Eastern partnership media freedom landscape-2013. Nadine Gogu, executive director of the IJC, pointed out that if a channel shows tendencies of informational manipulation and illegal propaganda, the BCC is to impose penalties, including exclusion of these programs from the grid of retransmitted programs and their replacement with original/domestic products.

Petru Macovei, executive director of the AIP, added that compliance with the law “is not an anti-democratic action.” Noting the tendency of serious informational manipulation by some Russian televisions retransmitted in Moldova in the context of the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, media experts consider it necessary to review and/or supplement some provisions of the Broadcasting Code that regulate the retransmission of foreign channels on the territory of Moldova and set the enforcement procedure and amount of penalties for violations of the law.

In a letter to the BCC, the representatives of media NGOs insist on the need to develop a strategy and an action plan that would contribute to holding accountable the broadcasters and service distributors that retransmit foreign broadcast programs on the territory of Moldova, so as to ensure compliance with the principles of social and political balance, pluralism of opinions, neutrality and objectivity, as well as the consumers’ right to complete, objective and true information by means of broadcasting outlets.