The legislative proposal to amend the Code of Audiovisual Media Services that was introduced into Parliament on November 23 contains unjustified and even dangerous interventions in a number of articles. Representatives of media NGOs said that if a bill with such contradictions, without mechanisms is adopted, the possibility of implementing it will be almost equal to zero. The media NGOs intend to ask the responsible parliamentary commission to discuss with media community the provisions that will affect this and to also warn the community of donors about dangerous provisions of this bill, IPN reports.
In public debates staged by the Association of Independent Press (API), the Association’s executive director Petru Macovei said the authors of the proposal said the obligations of media service providers to transmit local programs need to be standardized, the confidentiality of the sources of information should be ensured, the Code should be supplemented with norms concerning the protection of victims of domestic violence and changes should be made to ensure Moldova’s information security.
Ion Bunduchi, executive director of the Electronic Press Association (APEL), said he does not understand why a law that was adopted less than two years ago needs to be modified so much and why the quotas of local media productions are reduced as this would stimulate information parasitism and purchases of foreign rating products for making money based on them.
MP Adrian Lebedinschi, who heads the commission on culture, education, research, sport and the media and is one of the authors of the proposal, said there are two types of licenses: multiplex authorization issued by the Audiovisual Council and technical authorization issued by the ANRCETI, they both being interdependent. As a result of discussions with representatives from the multiplex sector, these asked to amend the law so that the technical license has the same period of validity as the multiplex one. Not all the 15 available slots were filled. By this yearend, there will be distributed 15,000 set-top boxes to socially deprived families so that analogical television is fully abandoned to the benefit of the digital one next year.
API president Eugeniu Rybka noted that the proposals to amend Articles 5 and 6 of the Audiovisual Code, which refer to the European audiovisual products, run counter to the provisions of the European Convention on Transfrontier Television, but Moldova undertook particular commitments that will be ignored if the proposed amendments are adopted. Also, Parliament cannot oblige the audiovisual media services, radios, TV channels to modify the internal documents within three months with or without the participation of the Audiovisual Council.
Tatiana Puiu, of the Freedom House, said the current legislation offers sufficient guarantees to journalist to protect their sources, which is not only a freedom of the journalist, but also a deontological obligation. The provisions concerning the revealing of the sources of information if this is necessary for protection national security make the journalist reveal the sources.
