Mass media in Moldova are perceived as an economic activity. Currently, there is no problem in identifying the owner of a mass media company. The information is known because a company cannot be registered without knowing who the final beneficiary is. The statement was made by Liberal-Democrat MP Chiril Lucinschi, head of the parliamentary commission for mass media, in reply to a study that highlighted the gaps in Moldovan legislation regarding the transparency of mass media ownership, Info-Prim Neo reports. Chiril Lucinschi said during a talk-show on public TV that neither the Broadcasting Coordinating Council, nor NGOs had access to this information. “Nonetheless, these things do work and there is some degree of transparency for the state”. The experts of the Independent Journalism Center who authored the study “Transparency of mass media ownership in Moldova” recommend the Broadcasting Code to be amended with provision that would obligate the broadcasters and service providers to inform CCA about their owners. “I want CCA to have to have on its website a list of all mass media owners, but there is a problem: de jure and de facto owners. This is not a problem only in Moldova. We can publish the owners name on a website or where we want, but people don’t watch a single channel, they watch TV”, said the MP. Executive director of the Association of Independent Press (API) Petru Macovei remarked during the same talk-show that it was not enough for the names of mass media owners to be known only to authorities, because this was about the consumer’s rights. He added that in the Parliament there were several owners of TV channels and they would oppose to any amendments regarding the transparency of mass media ownership. Petru Macovei explained that it is important for people to know the owner of the source of the information they consume, because the mass media consumer is the target of those who want to manipulate him. “When I know that the owner of channel X is businessman Y, I’ll know how to process the information. The fact that some TV channels don’t have any profit proves they were not created for business, but for manipulation”. The authors of the study launched on Tuesday say that the lack of transparency regarding mass media ownership leads to the concentration of mass media in the hands of a few groups of interest, which is a threat to media pluralism, the consumer’s right to information and the freedom of opinion.