Organizations for the defense of freedom of expression, human rights institutions, journalists’ unions and reference media all over the world have shown growing concern about the autocratic decisions of the supposedly democratic governments of Hungary and Poland due to the constant and more and more frequent attacks on the press that is not totally faithful to them. We offers you two interesting analyzes on this subject, from the prestigious Washington Post and EUobserver, expressing their concern about the increasingly frequent attacks on news pluralism.
The Editor of Other News, Feb.18, 2021
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Poland steps up an assault on free expression. The U.S. response will be crucial.
Opinion by Editorial Board – The Washington Post
LAST WEEK was a bad one for freedom of expression in Poland, a country that casts itself as one of the closest European U.S. allies. On Feb. 10, dozens of news outlets published black pages and TV screens went dark in protest of the government’s plans to impose an onerous new tax on media advertising. The same day, a leader of a movement that has led protests against draconian new abortion restrictions was charged with multiple criminal offenses. And one day previous, a judge ordered two respected Holocaust scholars to apologize for attributing blame to a Polish mayor for the murder of Jews during World War II.
All these acts were, in one way or another, the product of the right-wing nationalist movement that has controlled Poland’s government since 2015 and is slowly steering the country toward autocracy. The Law and Justice party has moved to strip courts of their independence, take control of independent media or drive them out of business, and silence critics of its far-right social policies. It also seeks to suppress any suggestion that individual Poles were complicit in the Holocaust, despite abundant evidence to the contrary.
The campaign against pluralism accelerated after Law and Justice narrowly won a presidential election last July. Since then, the state oil company purchased two dozen regional daily newspapers and 120 weeklies from their German owner, following the model of Hungary’s authoritarian government, which has silenced critical media through such sales. It floated laws aimed at forcing the sale or breakup of a U.S.-owned television station and a conglomerate that owns the most popular and respected newspaper, Gazeta Wyborcza — only to retreatunder heavy criticism.
The new advertising tax is aimed at the same targets. Large organizations such as U.S.-owned TVN and Gazeta Wyborcza would have to pay a tax of up to 15 percent on their advertising revenue, something that would curtail their ability to fund news coverage. A letter issued by the 43 media participating in last Wednesday’s protest called the tax “simply extortion” that could lead to the closing of private media, even as the government heaps funding on state outlets it has converted into propaganda organs. After the protest, officials said the law would be revised, but not abandoned.
The criminal case brought against Marta Lempart, a leader of the Polish Women’s Strike, was a reaction to mass protests that erupted after the constitutional court — which previously had been packed by Law and Justice — banned almost all abortions. Ms. Lempart was charged, among other things, for a radio interview she gave in which she praised demonstrators who allegedly disrupted church services.
Meanwhile, the libel suit against Holocaust scholars Jan Grabowski and Barbara Engelking was ginned up by the Polish League Against Defamation, which receives government funding. The aim was to discredit a 1,700-page study of the complicity of individual Poles in the Nazis’ mass murder of the country’s Jews. “In a normal world this case would have been dismissed long ago,” Mr. Grabowski told the New York Times. “But Poland can no longer be considered a normal democracy.”
Law and Justice was favored by President Donald Trump, who visited Warsaw and endorsed its nationalism. But last week, the spokesman of the Biden administration’s State Department noted the “constricting space for civil society in Poland” and added that “we do have broader concerns, including the proposed media tax.” We hope that’s the beginning of a significant shift in U.S. posture toward Poland’s anti-democratic drift.
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How Orbán killed a radio station
By Jamie Wiseman – EUobserver
In 2021 democracy does not die overnight. Rather, it is dismantled brick by brick until the pillars on which it once stood are hollowed out and crumble.
This slow erosion of democratic institutions has been underway for more than a decade now in Hungary, where the ruling Fidesz party has undermined media independence and pluralism to achieve a degree of media control unprecedented in an EU member state.
Today (15 February) yet another brick in the country’s democracy was removed, with devastating implications for press freedom both in Hungary and the wider EU.
At midnight last night, one of Hungary’s last remaining independent radio stations, Budapest-based Klubrádió, fell silent on the frequency on which it has broadcast since 2000.
It comes after a court in Budapest on 9 February sided with the government-controlled Hungarian Media Council and approved its decision not to renew the license of the country’s last remaining major independent radio broadcaster, Klubrádió.
Earlier this month, the same court also rejected Klubrádió’s last-ditch request for an emergency license to remain on air until the rival’s appeal was resolved.
The two rulings resign Klubrádió to broadcasting solely from the internet and cap the end of a decade-long campaign by the ruling Fidesz party led by prime minister Viktor Orbán to muzzle one of the country’s last major radio stations which airs views critical of the government.
For many in Hungary, there is a sense of déjà vu.
A decade ago, Klubrádió’s license renewal was blocked on similarly trivial grounds by the same Media Council, which has long been stacked with Fidesz appointees.
A grassroots campaign by more than 10,000 supporters and interventions from foreign politicians such as then-US secretary of state Hillary Clinton ensured the station was eventually awarded a long-term frequency in March 2013.
Frustrated by this setback, the Fidesz government was forced to look for alternative ways to silence the station.
Over the next few years, pressure on Klubrádió was ratcheted up as the station was fined and blacklisted for interviews, information and advertising from state-owned companies and agencies.
Meanwhile the media regulator stripped it of regional frequencies, confining it to the capital. Yet while other independent media in Hungary fell, Klubrádió stood firm.
Capital resistance
This situation became untenable for the government in 2019, when the liberal opposition candidate triumphed over the Fidesz incumbent in Budapest’s mayoral election.
Shaken by its first major electoral loss since 2010, the party immediately looked to punish those responsible and ensure defeat in the capital was not replicated in 2022’s parliamentary elections.
Where better to look than the city’s most influential liberal broadcaster?
As in 2011, the best opportunity for Fidesz to strike would be the contract renewal of Budapest FM 92.9 MH in 2020.
In the months leading up to the decision, the government began laying the groundwork.
When the time came for the license renewal to be considered, the Fidesz-controlled regulator interpreted two minor infringements from 2016 as “repeated violations” and blocked the extension. Rival bids were then rejected for trivial reasons, opening a lengthy appeal process.
To ensure Klubrádió would remain trapped in legal limbo during this time, in 2020 the government used its majority to amend the law on provisional licenses so that they can no longer be granted during ongoing litigation. Last-minute initiatives by opposition parties were blocked.
To shut off the last remaining avenue to remain on air, DAB+ digital broadcasting in Hungary was discontinued in 2020.
This multi-pronged effort to stack the deck against Klubrádió reflects the Hungarian government’s strategy of media and regulatory capture. State institutions have been filled with Fidesz loyalists and then abused to artificially distort the market and undermine independent media.
This has occurred under the noses of the EU, which has failed to recognise the severity of the issue or take appropriate action. Article 7 proceedings have had little effect and competition complains over market distortion have yet to be responded to.
The result is that over the last decade, the pillars of Hungary’s democracy have been severely weakened.
This would be alarming enough if it were not just one EU state that was affected. The success of the model in Hungary has not gone unnoticed.
Over the last five years, the Law and Justice (PiS) government in Poland has copied elements of the Orbán model for its own campaign against independent media. The Slovenian government of Janez Janša is also taking similar steps in that direction.
The recent announcement that the European Commission was engaging with the Hungarian government is a welcome development. It must urge Budapest to find a temporary solution to make sure Klubrádió is not wiped off the airwaves.
It is also abundantly clear the decision by the Media Council to block the license renewal did not respect the principles of proportionality or non-discrimination, and therefore contravened EU law.
The EU Commission has a responsibility to do all it can to stop the removal of yet another brick from the wall of Hungary’s country’s rapidly hollowing democracy.