Report on the Situation of the Press in Moldova in 2010 This report includes a brief description of all the important events that characterized the situation of the press in Moldova in 2010. Also, the report includes one section dedicated to the situation of the press in the Transnistrian region. Independent Journalism Center Contents1: I. Developments and trends in the Moldovan press in 2010 • Press freedom in Moldova according to international reports • Political context • Media in electoral campaigns • Media market II. Public broadcasting sector • Broadcasting Coordinating Council • Public broadcaster Teleradio-Moldova • Regional public broadcaster Teleradio-Găgăuzia • Teleradio Bălţi III. Freedom of expression and defamation in 2010 • Legislative developments • Defamation cases against media • Violations of journalists’ rights IV. Press freedom in Transnistria V. Conclusions and predictions for 2011 1 The report is available in Romanian, English and Russian. It was prepared by Doina Costin, Coordinator of the Department for Media Policy and Law of the Independent Journalism Center, with the financial support of Civil Rights Defenders, Sweden. The opinions expressed in this report are those of the Independent Journalism Center and do not necessarily represent those of the sponsors. 2 Independent Journalism Center “Mass media has the task of informing the public about issues of public interest and of performing, in accordance with its responsibilities, journalistic investigations on issues of public interest.” (Article 4 paragraph 2 of the Law on Freedom of Expression no. 64/2010) I. Developments and trends in the Moldovan press in 2010 Press freedom in Moldova according to international reports According to the report “Press Freedom Index 2010” published by Reporters sans Frontières (RsF) in October 2010, the Republic of Moldova has climbed 39 positions since last year’s press freedom ranking. In 2010, Moldova ranked 75th with a score of 19.13 compared with the rank of 114th and a score of 33.75 in 2009. This year Moldova ranked only two positions behind Greece and four positions behind Bulgaria. Romania was 22 positions higher than Moldova. The first five positions in the ranking of world press freedom according to the RsF report were held by Finland, Iceland, Holland, Norway and Sweden. Turkmenistan (176), North Korea (177) and Eritrea (178) were the countries with the worst scores regarding the situation of the press. In 2009, both the RsF report and the report published by Freedom House noted a decline in press freedom and in democracy in Moldova, but in 2010 press freedom indicators improved visibly, a trend that was registered in all reports measuring press freedom in Moldova. This trend is primarily due to the diversification of media sources, to encouragement of media competition, to the adoption of laws favorable to the freedom of expression and to the decrease in cases of aggression registered against media professionals. Political context The political situation in the country in 2010 was absolutely different from what it had been for the previous decade. The changes in the political arena that began in late 2009 continued to surprise and sometimes invigorate society in 2010; however, it was all somewhat precarious because of the imminence of new early parliamentary elections. In the course of the year, Moldova experienced the initiation of several reforms. It is true that not all of these beginnings had tangible effects or were received with enthusiasm by all social groups. In 2009 after Parliament failed to elect the President of the Republic of Moldova, the country was governed for almost a year and a half by an interim president. The year 2010 saw several attempts to solve the problem of failing to elect the president and of avoiding new parliamentary elections. Initially an attempt was made to change the procedure for electing the country’s president. There were two initiatives: one from the ruling Alliance for European Integration (AEI) and the second from the opposition—the Party of Communists—(PCRM). Neither of these initiatives for modifying the Constitution was supported by a sufficient number of votes. As a result, on September 5, 2010 the Republic of Moldova experienced the first constitutional referendum in its history aimed at directly involving voters in changing Article 78 of the Constitution of Moldova so that the president of the country could be elected by a direct vote of the citizens, thus ending the political crisis that affected the country. The referendum, however, failed owing to insufficient participation in voting, and the dissolution of Parliament became inevitable. 3 Independent Journalism Center New early parliamentary elections took place on November 28, 2010. The parties forming the AEI chose to participate in the electoral campaign separately. While at the beginning of the campaign citizens had the impression that former components of the AEI maintained solidarity and a common strategy, with the intensification of competition, the messages of some parties became visibly oriented against former partners. That caused difficulty for voters who in many cases would have voted for the AEI rather than for a separate component of the Alliance. The race for early parliamentary elections was joined by 20 political parties and by the same number of independent candidates. The Election Code was amended in 2010, and the threshold for parties to enter Parliament was lowered from 6% to 4%. Also, the amended Code included permission for electoral blocks, excluded the interdiction against candidates with dual citizenship in Parliament and amended provisions regarding coverage of the electoral campaign by mass media in order to increase freedom and to facilitate coverage among others. Due to these changes and to the interest of authorities in encouraging competition and participation in voting, the campaign for early parliamentary elections of November 28, 2010 was different from previous ones. Civil society and the electoral authorities launched and promoted educational campaigns in the press, broadcast media organized interactive electoral debates and competitors used novel campaigning approaches. The results of the November elections were not a lot different than those of the early parliamentary elections of July 29, 2009. Apart from minor dissimilarities, the outcome was again the inability to form a parliamentary majority able to elect the country’s president. After the elections of November 28, four parties were represented in Parliament: PCRM with 39.34% of the votes and 42 seats, the Liberal Democratic Party (LDPM) with 29.42% of the votes and 32 seats, the Democratic Party (DPM) with 12.70% of the votes and 15 seats and the Liberal Party (LP) with 9.96% of the votes and 12 seats. The other 35 candidates and parties together garnered 8.58% of the votes which were distributed among the four winners equally. The rate of participation in voting was 63.37%.2 The most spectacular leap in elections was made by LDPM which gathered about 13% more votes than in July 2009 thus obtaining 14 additional seats in the 19th Parliament. This party’s rating increased during the last year and a half when its leader held the position of Prime Minister. During his mandate in government, Vald Filat ranked at the top of politicians most trusted by citizens3 with 18.2% of respondents’ preferences. Our Moldova Alliance (OMA), on the contrary, did not manage to pass the threshold for representation gathering only 2.05% of the votes and was the only one of the four parties in the original AEI formed after the elections of July 2009 that was left out of Parliament in November 2010 and thus out of AEI-2. Currently, AEI-2 holds 59 seats; 61 votes are necessary to elect a president. In the first months of 2011, Parliament must elect a president in not more than two attempts. If it fails to do so, the ensuing political crisis will jeopardize any democratic efforts of the Executive Branch. The year 2011 will also witness local elections in Moldova, including in Chişinău 2 http://www.e-democracy.md/elections/parliamentary/2010/results/ 3 Barometrul Opiniei Publice (BOP), noiembrie 2010, http://ipp.md/libview.php?l=ro&idc=156&id=558&parent=0 4 Independent Journalism Center Municipality which has been governed for the past four years by Mayor Dorin Chistoaca, Vice- President of LP. Mass media in electoral campaigns In June 2010, the Moldovan Parliament adopted a number of modifications to the Electoral Code. Several articles referring to media involvement in electoral campaigns were amended, and some new provisions were introduced. In general, these amendments were deliberated with civil society, political parties, mass media and experts in the field. Civil society suggested several amendments, 80% of which were included in the draft law on the modification of the Code. Among others, they included the following: (i) provisions regarding electoral advertizing and coverage of the electoral campaign by mass media were split; (ii) a new article was included that contains the principles for media activity during electoral campaigns; (iii) guarantees were included both for electoral competitors and their access to media and for editorial independence and transparency among broadcasters and (iv) the responsibilities of the Broadcasting Coordinating Council (BCC) were separated from those of the Central Electoral Commission (CEC). Some of these modifications to the Electoral Code, however, contradict certain provisions of the