The President of the Government, Pedro Sanchezremains determined to exercise strict control over the media. Therefore, it will now impose a media journal know their owners and which people, companies or administrations finance them. The Executive, as the Minister of Culture explained on Tuesday, Ernest Urtasunwill mandate the National Securities Market Commission (CNMV) and the National Communications Market Commission (CNMC) to carry out this registration.
Urtasun explained that it had “chosen the CNMC as an autonomous and independent body” to carry out this registration. However, this will require a reform of the National Communications Market Commission to be able to carry out this new task. With this, Moncloa wants to know in detail who is behind the ownership of the publishing companies media published in our country.
The Executive’s intention is to have, through the creation of this register, public information on its assets and on the advertising investment that they receive, as part of their Action Plan for Democracy“to guarantee greater transparency and independence of the media.” Moncloa will ask the CNMC “to establish the criteria that define what is a media, among other platforms, whose purpose is not to inform.”
In addition to this registration, the government also wants to limit the advertising revenues that the media receive, both at the public and private levels. In the first case, establishing the ban on public funding if the guidelines and the obligation of annual publication of advertising investments by administrations are not respected. “This is information that today is not presented or is presented in an opaque manner,” he said, adding that from the implementation of this regulation, all public institutions must publish this information “in a visible, clear and transparent manner.”
The Executive will also reform the Institutional Advertising ActAs already announced by the President of the Government, Pedro Sanchezto introduce criteria of “transparency, proportionality and non-discrimination in their allocation”. Urtasun specified that these criteria will be developed on the basis of work with experts, the communications sector and parliamentary groups.
This same law, as the Minister of Culture has suggested, will be reformed to ensure that the audience measurement and the methodology they use are in line with the principles of transparency, impartiality, inclusiveness, proportionality, non-discrimination, comparability and verifiability. “We will reform the law so that the hearings cannot be falsified by practices that distort royal visits,” he stressed.
However, the social-communist government is seeking intimidate businessmen that contribute to the viability of the media, as long as they do not follow the guidelines set by La Moncloa. Sánchez dresses it all up with an “ambitious plan” to “improve our democracy,” according to the minister. Felix Bolanosat a time when journalistic investigations are thwarting the president and his wife, Begoña Gomezbilled based on certain information.
