Teleradio-Gagauzia continues to use deficient practices in election campaigns, APEL

The regional public broadcaster Teleradio-Gagauzia used deficient practices in covering the campaign for the September 5 constitutional referendum as in the previous election campaigns, say experts of the Electronic Press Association of Moldova (APEL). At the same time, the monitoring report of APEL shows the national public broadcaster Teleradio-Moldova covered the campaign rather adequately and multilaterally, for the first time after 2003. APEL monitored the public broadcasters during August 5 and September 5, 2010 within a project of the Civic Coalition for Free and Fair Elections. The monitoring results were made public in a news conference held at Info-Prim Neo on September 13. Expert involved in the monitoring project Aneta Gonta said Teleradio-Gagauzia allowed derogations from the electoral legislation. “This regional company offered free airtime for electoral messages only during the first three days of the campaign. The electoral debates on the radio were held not during prime time. It also broadcast electoral adverts of parties on September 4,” Aneta Gonta said. Another expert of the project, Vlad Turcanu said only one voter education program was broadcast on the TV channel of Teleradio-Gagauzia, while on the radio station – no one. “The national public broadcaster Teleradio-Moldova broadcast enough voter education programs and advertisements. It held debates in a new format that was more effective compared with the previous election campaigns,” Vlad Turcanu said. The report also shows that the public broadcasters organized sufficient electoral debates even if a large part of the participants in the referendum were rather passive. The monitoring report was compiled by APEL as part of a project of the Civic Coalition for Free and Fair Elections financed by Soros-Moldova Foundation.