IJC says government promotes its interests via Audiovisual Code

Although the efforts made by international organisations (European Council, OSCE) and media NGOs in Moldova in working out the Audiovisual Code have been without precedent, the government succeeded to adopt a law which would promote its own interests. This conclusion has been drawn in the annual report “Freedom of speech and information in Moldova in 2006”, worked out by the Independent Centre of Journalism. According to the report, the power succeeded once again to elect a Coordinating Council of Audiovisual (CCA) which suits it, to maintain the control over the “Teleradio-Moldova” Company, and even subdue other two audiovisual institutions, which had an independent editorial policy earlier: radio “Antena C” and “Euro TV Chisinau”. The report’s authors attest that both the Code’s draft and the adopted normative act were subject to serious criticism from media organisations and political parties. Numerous statements were launched in the period from March to August 2006 on this issue. Also, the civil society organised a series of debates and roundtables in order to improve the bill and convince the authors of the necessity to adopt the highest standards in the domain. Although they didn’t have a very significant impact, some amendments have been made to the art 16 of the Civil Code, which stipulates the responsibility for libel. A series of criteria which would help the judge to decide upon the “reasonable” remedies for defamed persons has been added to the article. However, the amendments did not include a top limit for the compensation of moral damages, a thing requested by many mass media sources. Both the Parliament and the Government adopted, in the summer of 2006, decisions providing the institution of 10 to 20% increases in the wages of some civil servants who have permanent access to the state secret. These decisions were adopted with retroactive effect, entering into force on December 1, 2005. According to the experts in the field of access to information, these decisions will stimulate the obsession for secrets in state institutions. Besides state secrets, which have to be protected, also information of public concern would be hidden, because many civil servants would not distinguish the difference between the two notions. On the other hand, officials of the Information and Security Service brought arguments on the necessity of applying these increases, by the implementation of a provision of the Law on the state secret, dated 1994, as well as because of the numerous restrictions of rights and freedoms that the state secrets holders have to face. The report “Freedom of speech and information in Moldova in 2006” includes a brief description of dome significant events which characterised the media situation in Moldovain 2006. The report is divided into the following sections: legislative evolution, Development of the audiovisual, Situation of the press and the investigative journalism, Press in the electoral campaign, Access to information, Prospects.