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Since 2014, different pretexts have been used so as not to solve this problem. In 2015, at the first Mass Media Forum in Moldova, Parliament Speaker Andrian Candu said that “it was not an easy decision” [the decision not to allow journalists’ access to plenary Parliament meetings], but that MPs were willing to improve working conditions for the journalists accredited into the Parliament, for example, to offer them coffee or parking spots for bicycles. In 2014, another MP said in the plenum of the Parliament that 2 thousand lei were needed to solve this issue, as all deficiencies consisted in moving some cables…
“If lack of cables is the problem, the Independent Journalism Center offers 15 meters of cable in order to solve it,” was the message with which journalists resumed their protests in front of the Parliament building.
Jurnal TV reporter Alina Cujba, who came to support the IJC campaign, told us: “We, journalists, want more transparency. We want to know the reality. Now, MPs are those who decide what images to give to journalists. But in order to objectively cover a topic, we need to film what and who we find important. If we had free access into the Parliament’s meeting room, we would have the possibility to build news stories as we see them, and not with the images that we get from the Parliament’s responsible officials.”
This opinion was shared by another participant in the protest, Ziarul de Garda newspaper reporter Tatiana Beghiu: “What we see on the screen is only 30% of what actually happens in the Parliament’s meeting room. In order to be able to produce objective materials, we need to see the reality from other angles as well, not only from what MPs offer to us. We need access to the meeting room in order to be fair, objective and to present reality as it is.”
The journalists who attended the event signed a new petition, asking the Parliament’s leadership to fulfill the promises related to creation of better working conditions for the journalists accredited to the Parliament, so that they could freely do their job. “Limiting journalists’ access to the works of the Parliament’s plenum and placing them into a room without proper working conditions is a violation of the right to freedom of expression and of the right to work. At the same time, these actions are contrary to the principle of decision making transparency,” the petition says.
The IJC message and the 15 meters of cable have been transmitted to the Parliament Office. Journalists’ protests will continue in front of the Parliament building on the days when MPs gather for plenary meetings.
