04. 03. 2013

Separate opinion and general remarks of the Media Coalition to the Draft Law on Public Information and Media

The Action Plan of the Media Strategy has foreseen the development of new media laws, one of which is the law governing public information. The Working Group, formed by the Ministry of Culture and Media in late 2012, has recently completed work on the Draft Law on Public Information and Media which, in addition to the public information, regulates the issue of accreditation and position of foreign journalists and foreign correspondents' offices, as well as the issue of transparency and the unauthorized merging of media ownership. Minister of Culture and Information has forwarded that Draft Law for a public debate, which will be held from February 27 to March 22, 2013.

In mid-January 2013, ANEM President Sasa Mirkovic was included in the work of the Working Group as a representative of the Media Coalition (ANEM, NUNS, UNS, NDNV and Local Press). During the work on the draft of this Law, Sasa Mirkovic represented the views and suggestions of the Media Coalition for improvement of some of the solutions provided in the Draft. Some proposals were accepted by the Working Group and they have been included in the Draft Law. However, some important remarks were not acknowledged, so certain issues, according to the Media Coalition, had not been adequately regulated by the Draft. Therefore, during the adoption of the final version of the Working Group's Draft Law, Sasa Mirkovic stated separate opinion for specific articles (Article 8; Paragraph 4 of Article 20; Article 21; Article 26; Article 31; Article 52; Article 53; Article 91; Paragraph 5 of Article 154) and afterwards, submitted it to the Ministry in a written form on behalf of the Media Coalition.

In addition to the specific remarks made to particular articles of the Draft, Sasa Mirkovic also presented, during the sessions of the Working Group, general remarks of the Media Coalition to the Draft's text, which were generally not accepted. They related primarily to the ambiguity, contradiction and excessive number of rules, which, instead of fostering media pluralism and freedom of expression, have actually limited them (some generals are only declarative with no specific elaboration of norms; vagueness of the provisions on project financing; excessive number of rules on the media register; excessive number of rules and vagueness of the provisions on correction, recall and response; insufficiently recognized importance of self-regulation; necessity of defining specific rules on media concentration at local/regional level; under-regulated position of journalists, especially relative to their labor status; necessity of harmonizing and explaining terms used in the law).

The Media Coalition will stand for its separate opinion and general remarks in the public discussion at the round tables. In addition, the Media Coalition will submit to the Ministry its written comments and suggestions for improving the Draft Law.

Separate opinion and general remarks of the Media Coalition have been produced by ANEM legal team.

Here you can see Separate opinion and General remarks of the Media Coalition to the Draft Law on Public Information and Media:

Separate opinion (Srb)
General remarks (Srb)
Separate opinion (Eng)
General remarks (Eng)