Discussions were opened on the amendments to the Broadcasting Code provided in two bills. One of the bills was put forward by the Communist faction, while the other one by the government coalition, IPN reports.
In the first round of public discussions, the head of the Parliament’s commission on culture, education, youth, sport and mass-media Chiril Lucinschi said that three TV channels were excluded from the packages of cable service providers or transferred to other networks at the beginning of this year. After this, Parliament proposed regulating by law the relations between the broadcasters and providers of TV programs.
Communist MP Alexandr Petkov said the bill submitted by the Communist faction provides that the cable service providers should be obliged to include all the national channels with informative and analytical programs in the basic packages. It also proposes naming the members of the Broadcasting Coordination Council (BCC) by the votes of 2/3 of the MPs, as earlier.
The Council’s chairman Marian Pocaznoi said that he is not against this proposal, but it seems strange to him that the Government can be voted in by a simple majority of votes, while the members of the BCC – by the votes of the parliamentary majority. In Moldova, there are 65 TV channels and all of them, even the music ones, have informative or analytical programs. “Thus, the providers will have to transmit all the 65. Provisions should be added to specify that there must be included only the TV channels operating in the provider’s area of work,” stated Marian Pocaznoi.
The bill drafted by the government coalition says the service providers should be obliged to include national private TV channels with national coverage in the basic packages free of charge as these channels also provide services free of charge.
The representatives of cable service providers called on the MPs not to forget that they are economic entities and aim to make profit from their work. They agreed that the national TV channels should be included in the basic packages, but underlined that the number of foreign chancels should not be restricted.
