Broadcast media is more objective than in previous election campaigns, report

02.11.2010 13:38
1038
3 minute(s)

The broadcast media is more objective and neutral in this election campaign compared with the previous ones. Most of the broadcast materials do not favor the election contenders. Such conclusions are contained in the second monitoring report of the Independent Journalism Center on how the mass media cover the campaign for the November 28 early parliamentary elections, Info-Prim Neo reports. In a news conference on Tuesday, the Center’s head Nadine Gogu said the radio stations and television channels broadcast a large number of materials with both direct and indirect electoral impact. They included mainly opinion and news programs where representatives of different political parties appeared as sources quoted directly or indirectly. The public stations Moldova 1 and Radio Moldova offered access to a larger number of election contenders. Most often, there had been quoted representatives of the parties that form part of the Alliance for European Integration. In most of the cases, the subjects were covered impartially, though the ruling parties were slightly favored, Nadine Gogu said. He also said that the private TV channels Pro TV and TV7 are not monitored in this election campaign as they were evenhanded. Instead, there were monitored new channels. According to the results of the monitoring, the channel 2 Plus has a rather passive behavior and offers the public summary information about the election campaign. It does not broadcast opinion programs centering on the elections. The channels Jurnal TV and Publika TV cover the electoral events neutrally, but Jurnal TV favors slightly the Liberal Democratic Party and the Liberal Party. N4 offered more airtime to the representatives of the Liberal Democratic Party and the Communists Party. Another private channel, Prime TV, which has national coverage, covered mainly subjects with direct electoral connotation. Its materials featured both the ruling alliance and the Communists Party, mainly in a neutral context. “Judging by the frequency of the appearance of election contenders, we can say that Prime TV favors the Democratic Party to a certain extent,” Nadine Gogu stated. The Center’s monitors established that the channel NIT evidently favors the Communists Party and puts the governing alliance in a bad light. The extraparliamentary parties appear seldom on this channel. Mass media expert Petru Macovei said it is very serious when the newscasts become opinion programs and the reporter does not report news, but states his or her opinion and lays emphasis on certain things. The Monitoring of the Mass Media in the Election Campaign Project is implemented by the Independent Journalism Center in partnership with the Association of Independent Press and the Marketing and Polling Institute IMAS-INC Chisinau. The monitoring period is September 28 and November 28. The third report will be made public next week.