Media NGOs and experts from the field expressed their concern about the pace of reforms and political bias in the mass media, in particular about the selection of the members of the Broadcasting Coordination Council (BCC) and the Supervisory Board (SB) of the National Public Broadcaster “Teleradio-Moldova” according to political criteria.
In a news conference at IPN, Petru Macovei, executive director of the Association of Independent Press, said there is no transparency in the process of choosing the members of the SB and BCC. The terms in office of three members of the BCC will soon expire and these are to be replaced and the appointments will be again based on political criteria. The four new members of the SB named by Parliament two weeks ago were in fact designated by the Liberal Democratic Party and the Democratic Party, while another two members who are to be confirmed will be fielded by the Communists.
Ion Bunduchi, executive director of the Electronic Press Association, said the members of the SB and BCC were always named according to political criteria and this led to an invasion of foreign TV channels in Moldova. This affected the informational sovereignty of the state and now anyone can launch an information war. The naming of the members of the SB and BCC by a party is actually not so important. It is more important that these posts should be held by professionals.
Nadine Gogu, director of the Independent Journalism Center, said the new members of the SB could not be selected during over a year because the parties could not come to term. Famous experts from the field remained outside the contest. The politicians do not want people who would demand doing real reforms at the public television to work on the SB or professionals to serve on the BCC.
The experts also spoke about the delay in switching over from analogical television to digital one, saying somebody wants to control the broadcasting sector by making the providers broadcast the TV signal only through IPTV, not yet through the classical method proposed earlier. The field risks being controlled by a person, while its development would be chaotic.
Media expert Ion Terguta said the switchover to digital television must be completed in three months and, judging by the revenues reported by the cable TV providers, somebody wants to make a profitable business of this activity. The authorities delay implementing the decisions on the switchover to digital television because, if the IPTV is ultimately implemented, 75% of the country’s population that now do not pay for TV services, will have to pay for them. The cyber-attacks on TV Starnet form part of a broader plan aimed at removing an opponent of Moldtelecom, which could be privatized.
The members of civil society consider that both society and the development partners must exert pressure on the politicians so that these implement real reforms in the broadcasting sector. Civil society proposed that the EU should provide support only if reforms are done. These and other proposals will be presented in the first round of public debates scheduled for March 24.
