Last radio & TV frequency contest has unfolded with legal deviations: media ONG case study

The process of organizing and unfolding the contest for using radio and TV frequencies of May 7, this year, bore a defective character and unfolded with deviations from the law. This is one of the conclusions of the case study performed by 10 media NGOs, which, under the aegis of the APEL Electronic Press Association, monitor the way in which the provisions of the Broadcasting Code are applied, Info-Prim Neo has learnt from the respective project. The monitors considers that the Broadcasting Coordinating Council (BCC) failed to word the requirements for the program services demanding frequencies. At the same time, the files of the participants have been assessed lacking clear differentiating criteria by the BCC, which is obliged to draft and make them public. Lacking those, the credibility of some decisions of the BCC is doubted by the applicants for frequencies, the experts signal out. The NGOs also point to the fact that the decision of BCC as to the result of the contest does not contain persuading arguments to justify the results of the voting. The experts find that the BCC, repeatedly, makes decisions without reasoning them, breaching the Broadcasting Code (BC). In the monitors' opinion, the phrase “following the public debate and in conformity with the open voting, the winner is…”, used every time in the BCC's decision as an argument, is far from representing a criterion reasoning the passed decisions. According to the monitors, further not observing some exact provisions of the BC arises the broadcasters' suspicion and puzzlement, as well as the opinion of the public opinion and of program consumers. Also the BCC's image as an autonomous public authority is damaged, responsible for implementing the BC. For the contest announced by the BCC on February 26, 49 applicants subscribed, of which 11 wanted a new activity period, 25 wanted to expand their broadcasting area and 13 wanted to set up new broadcasters. The results of the contest were published in Monitorul Oficial al R. Moldova on June 3. The media and human rights NGOs, under APEL's aegis, are monitoring the way in which the provisions of the Broadcasting Code are applied as part of a project financed by the Soros Foundation, meant to institute a controlling public mechanism over the way in which the broadcasting law is applied in Moldova. The team implementing the project is made of experts and consultants from the civil society: the Independent Jurists Association, the Independent Press Association, the Association of Independent TV Journalists, Acces-Info Center, the Independent Journalism Center, the Committee for the Freedom of the Press, the Committee for the Defense of Human and Professional Rights, the Jurists for Human Rights, OWH Studio, the Journalists’ Union of Moldova .