2014: A retrospective on the media situation in the Republic of Moldova

The situation of the media in Moldova in 2014 exactly mirrored the socio-political situation both nationally and worldwide. Manipulating information and propaganda through Russian media rebroadcasts in Moldova were some of the unconventional weapons used by the Russian Federation to counteract the intentions of former Soviet republics to integrate politically and economically into the European Union. Local authorities failed to react promptly and properly to these assaults in order to secure the country’s information space. The Broadcast Coordinating Council (BCC) decision to suspend rebroadcasts of a Russian TV channel in Moldova for noncompliance with Moldovan legislation led to increased animosity between officials from Chisinau and those from the Gagauz Yeri Autonomy and deepened polarizations in society. The parliamentary elections took place on a battlefield between pro-European and pro-Russian political vectors with most media politically biased., These are some of the general conclusions of the annual Report on Media Situation in Moldova in 2014 launched by the Independent Journalism Center (IJC) in February 2015.

According to the 5 chapters of the report, in 2014 the BCC’s authority was weak due to outdated legislation and the political affiliations of its members.  The work of public broadcasters was also affected by the political situation in the country. The public broadcaster Teleradio Moldova has had no Supervisory Body for over a year since Parliament failed to elect 6 of the 9 members of the Board, and the regional broadcaster Teleradio Gagauzia was affected by internal disputes within its management before elections for the bascan (local governor of the region) and local general elections.

Another conclusion of the report points out that the Broadcasting Code proved to be imperfect to the authorities too. Although they refused to adopt the new code developed by civil society, various political parties proposed a number of initiatives to change the code in order to address problems that had hindered broadcasters’ performance during the past years: protecting information space, media monopolies and lack of transparency of media ownership among others.

One chapter is dedicated to the situation of the media in the Transnistrian region which points to the control of local authorities over the media in the region, including online resources.

The forecasts for media in 2015 that conclude the report are not too optimists taking into account that this year the events and information flow will focus on the local general elections that will take place in summer.
 
The report was developed within the “Improving the media law environment in Moldova” project with the financial support of Civil Rights Defenders (Sweden) and is available in Romanian, English and Russian.