NIT, Moldova Suverana and Nezavisimaya Moldova became ‘speaking trumpets’ of PCRM, report

The TV channel NIT and the publications Moldova Suverana and Nezavisimaya Moldova became the ‘speaking trumpets’ of the Communist Party (PCRM), says the fourth report on the monitoring of the election campaign presented by the Independent Journalism Center, Info-Prim Neo reports. The ten media outlets monitored by the Center were selected on the basis of such criteria as audience and broadcast language. In a news conference on June 16, the Center’s head Nadine Gogu said that NIT promoted openly the PRCM’s team. Most of the news items broadcast by NIT were biased and sometimes discrediting. The channel used an aggressive journalistic language and images that do not observe the professional and deontological principles. “The very large volume and the content of news stories show that NIT is a politically biased TV channel from editorial viewpoint, which runs counter to the professional deontology and legislation,” said Nadine Gogu. According to the monitoring report, the private channel with national coverage Prime TV observed the professional and ethic standards in its electoral subjects. However, the channel continued to favor slightly the Democratic Party and its candidates for mayor and local councilors. Euro TV and Jurnal TV had a balanced behavior and did not seriously deviate from the professional and deontological standards. As regards the frequency and context of the appearance of the election runners at the two TV channels, the Liberal Party’s candidate for mayor of Chisinau was slightly favored. N4 generally met the deontological and professional standards as regards the covering of the election campaign, but aired a larger number of news stories about the leader of the PLDM. As to the print media, mass media expert Petru Macovei said the papers Moldova Suverana and Nezavisimaya Moldova were openly biased towards the PCRM’s candidate and against the PL’s candidate for mayor of Chisinau. Both of the newspapers were impartial and did not ensure plurality of opinion. The language used, especially in the opinion articles, was often pejorative. Many articles were accompanied by truncated pictures, which is against the deontological norms. According to the expert, the paper Adevarul covered the end of the election campaign in a balanced way and took the side of none of the electoral competitors. Jurnal de Chisinau committed no evident deviations from the deontological and professional standards, but favored slightly the PL’s candidate for the mayoralty of Chisinau. Timpul de dimineata covered actively the election campaign, without breaking the ethical and professional principles, said Petru Macovei. The report covers the period between May 30 and June 12. It was produced within the Monitoring of the Mass Media in the Election Campaign Project with financial support from East Europe Foundation, from the resources provided by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency and the Foreign Ministry of Denmark.