The media in Moldova should become less colored politically and more credible before the people and of a higher quality. The director of the Independent Journalism Center Nadine Gogu has told IPN that they want the media in 2015 to be of a higher quality and to meet the deontological norms because the previous years the media outlets served the interests of particular political players rather than the public interests.
“I would like the media to remember that they must serve the public as they significantly narrow their audience if they do not work for the public. As to the quality, there is place for the better,” stated Nadine Gogu. She added that continuous training in the mass media is needed not only for journalists, but also for editors as the exodus of staff in this area is high.
Speaking about this year’s local elections, Nadine Gogu said there are fears that the media will continue to serve the interests of some persons. “I fear that in the local elections we will see the same situation as in the parliamentary elections –media colored politically. In the previous elections, some of the media outlets disadvantaged particular contenders. This makes us think that they worked by order. We intuit that we will witness a similar situation,” she stated.
In 2015, the Independent Journalism Center expects that the new government will fulfill the promises that remained undelivered over the last few years. According to the Institute’s director, all the Government’s plans include commitments concerning the mass media, but only 30% of them were fulfilled. “There are many unfulfilled promises and we hope that this year the new government will start to deliver them,” said Nadine Gogu.
According to her, the most serious shortcomings include the non-adoption in the final reading of the law on media ownership transparency. All the members of the Supervisory Board of “Teleradio-Moldova” Company must be appointed as this body has been non-functional for over a year because of the absence of quorum. The Independent Journalism Center submitted to Parliament a bill to improve the procedure for registering applications concerning access to information, to reduce the term for presenting information and to toughen up punishment for violating the legislation on access to information by persons responsible for providing information.
