BRATISLAVA, March 23, (WEBNOVINY) – MPs advanced a revision to the Press Act to the second reading Wednesday. In line with new rules, all public functionaries, chairpersons and deputy chairs of political parties as well as political parties will lose the right to reply if the published critical statements are related to the execution of their competence. The right to reply, however, is preserved for public officials if they apply it as private individuals, in compliance with the Constitution of the Slovak Republic. The right to reply will be limited to untrue, incomplete or truth distorting statements. The applicable law enables reaction even to true statements.
The complainant, whether a private individual or a legal entity, must first and foremost prove the incorrectness of the statement published by the media when applying for reply. What is more, the new norm scraps sanctions.
In the debate on the draft, ex-minister of culture and incumbent MP for SMER-SD Marek Madaric said that the coalition’s intention in tailoring the new wording of the Press Act, is to pay lip service to publishers and repay a debt for support in the previous election term. He said that the core of the revamped act is cancellation of sanctions for publishers for the failure to publish a correction or a reply. This in fact deprives the public of the possibility to have the once published information fixed. “Not curbing the right of reply but the cancellation of the right to correction is a key change in the Press Act,” argued Madaric in the parliamentary discussion on the Press Act amendment from the workroom of the Culture Ministry.
According to opposition SNS MP Rafael Rafaj, the discussed draft a law that privileges the proprietors and publishers of newspapers. As Rafaj emphasized in the discussion, no one even has a clue about who manages the medium, as the proprietors are often hidden behind an anonymous limited liability, foreign or joint-stock company. He thinks that the public has the right to information and should know about the ownership of media.
“If we want to change something, let’s adopt an extensive, generalized law,” said Rafaj. He does not approve of the fact that according to the new law, all public officials, chairmen and vice chairman of political parties, as well as political parties themselves, would lose the right of reply. Rafaj claims that public officials are already handicapped by the fact that they have to tolerate the opinions in media. “I haven’t noticed that public officials would en masse make use of the current law; the numbers are rather minimal,” said Rafaj.
SDKU-DS MP Tomas Galbavy also has some reservations; however, he agrees that the draft is better than the currently valid law. Galbavy said that according to the draft, everyone would have the right to react and to defend their dignity, but only in the event that the information published is not true. “This is a huge shift toward making media free. We can expect that information will then be more objective and unbiased,” stated Galbavy.
SITA