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According to the Regulations on the coverage of the electoral campaign for the parliamentary elections of 30 November 2014, approved by the Central Electoral Commission (CEC) on 30 September, every broadcaster intending to cover the electoral campaign has the obligation to submit to the Broadcasting Coordinating Council a declaration about the name of the owner/owners of the media outlet’s legal entity. “These declarations had to indicate the individuals that own these outlets and are responsible for the editorial policy of a television or radio,” explained media law expert Eugeniu Ribca.
Such declarations have already been published on the website of the broadcasting regulator. A simple verification of the documents submitted by the broadcasters that committed to cover the electoral campaign shows that instead of the owners’ names they indicated the names of the companies that own media outlets. For example, the names of founders of Publika TV and Prime TV are, firstly, identical, and, secondly, they are companies – ÎCS ”MBDIA PRODUCTION” SRL, with a share of 37%, and OTIV PRIME MEDIA B.V, with a share of 63%.
According to Eugeniu Ribca, the BCC had the obligation, upon receiving these declarations, to verify if they are completed according to the current legislation and to reject the documents that are inconsistent with the law or to request that they be corrected. “It appears that the BCC again did a pointless routine work, which led to this situation. In this case, the BCC had to verify whether broadcasters submitted declarations according to the law, because the current legislation provides for clear obligations in this regard,” the expert believes.
In his turn, the new BCC president, Dinu Ciocan, believes that all the declarations submitted by broadcasters to the BCC have been verified by specialists and that they comply with legal requirements. “They include exactly the information specified in the Regulations on the coverage of the electoral campaign. The documents that we have indicate, in terms of owners, the founding companies of these broadcasters, according to the information from the State Registration Chamber. They are legal entities. The Regulations do not request the names of final beneficiaries, which was a requirement in a draft modification of the Broadcasting Code, which had not been approved in final reading,” Dinu Ciocanu specified.
At the moment, according to Eugeniu Ribca, only the Central Electoral Commission might interfere and request that the BCC comply with the legislation. This problem might be reviewed by the future Parliament by verifying the correctness and legality of the BCC activities during 2014.
Source of photo: http://www.pressalert.ro/
