Broadcasting Council refuses to prolong PRO TV's license: its manager

The Moldovan Broadcasting Coordinating Council (BCC) refuses to prolong the license of PRO TV Chisinau. According to a press communique signed by the station's manager on December 11, “the BCC claims would-be violations linked to the lack of newscasts for the deaf, the amount of advertising and replacing a news journal produced by PRO TV Bucharest,” Info-Prim Neo reports. “PRO TV considers groundless the refusal of the BCC and specifies the presented reasons are totally groundless to serve as a basis to decline the legal right to have our license prolonged,” reads a release signed by Catalin Giosan. PRO TV will sue the BCC's refusal to prolong its license expiring on December 23, 2008, and say it will use all the legal ways to protect its interests and rights in Moldova. Both the BCC's chairman Gheorghe Gorincioi and its lawyer Marcel Otel could not be found to comment the refusal. When asked by Info-Prim Neo, an expert with the APEL Broadcasters Association, Eugen Rabca, has explained the BCC could have made another decision in this respect. According to the lawyer, the Broadcasting Code of 2006 entitled the BCC to prolong the licenses of broadcasters if they have worked in accordance with the law and license. By the end of 2006, the Parliament adopted the BCC's statute. According to that document, the BCC does not have the right to prolong the licenses granted before adopting the Code in 2006. Taking into account the licenses are issued for 7 years, the BCC will be able to prolong the licenses only after 2013, Eugen Rabca specified. Under these circumstances, the BCC will set Pro TV's frequency up for contest after December 23. Christian-Democratic MPs have recently asked the law-enforcing bodies to check ProTV's work, accusing the station of allegedly “undermining the institutions of the state of law.” Opposition parties and media NGOs stated the attacks against PRO TV pursue to deprive the station of its license and to rig the 2009 parliamentary elections, this way.