For the third time, the Communications Commission is disputing an alleged violation of the “Law on Broadcasting” by the television company “Formula.” The Commission discussed the issue at its July 17 session and fined “Formula” 5,000 GEL.
According to the Commission’s assessment, “Formula” violated Article 54 of the Law of Georgia on Broadcasting – “Fairness and Impartiality.” According to the official report, the monitoring of the 17:00 broadcasts of Formula News was conducted between June 15 and 17. The Commission considers that journalists in these news broadcasts occasionally expressed personal opinions and attitudes regarding current events, as “Formula” systematically uses phrases in the disputed segments such as: “the ‘Dream’ government,” “the ‘Georgian Dream’ President,” “‘Dream’s’ Prosecutor’s Office,” “‘Dream’s’ Prime Minister,” “‘Dream’s’ Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” “repressive laws,” and “repressions of the ‘Dream’ regime.”
At this stage, the Commission only applied a fine and did not resort to an alternative sanction, which, according to the legislation, involves suspending the television station’s broadcasting authorization. If the Commission establishes another violation by “Formula,” it will again be authorized to consider suspending the station’s broadcasting authorization or imposing an increased fine—not less than 10,000 GEL and not exceeding 3% of the company’s annual income. For the use of similar terms, the Communications Commission had already fined “Formula” 2,500 GEL on May 21 for violating the same article.
The case is being considered against the backdrop of recent, controversial amendments to the “Law on Broadcasting” concerning the content regulation of broadcasters. Under these amendments, expressing personal positions is restricted in news programs and during the coverage of public policy issues (with the exception of author-driven editorial programs). Additionally, new rules were established regarding the right of reply and the gathering and dissemination of information through covert methods.
On March 6, the Communications Commission announced that it would begin enforcing the norms established by the “Law on Broadcasting” and the “Broadcasters’ Code of Conduct” in practice and would start monitoring broadcasters. At the time, the Commission pointed out that for almost a year, it had only reacted to complaints and had not initiated administrative proceedings against broadcasters on its own initiative.
