The Media Development Centre is continuously involved in the ongoing public debate on the necessary reforms in the media sector in the Republic of Macedonia. MDC believes that the adoption of the changes to the audiovisual media services legislation, currently stuck in parliamentary procedure without any indication when they may be adopted, doesn’t mean we should refrain from continuing discussions about future steps in reforms of legislation and other reforms in the media sector.

The reforms in the media sector should primarily assist us in the elimination of detected weaknesses that contributed to the high level of vulnerability of the media sector to various forms of pressure. Those pressures are commonly manifested as economic pressures, regardless of their actual motivation or goal, abusing the low sustainability of the media market in the country. Ultimately, the reforms should contribute to the creation of a free, democratic, pluralist and sustainable media system.

The Media Development Centre, under the auspices of its activities for promotion of public discussion of open issues in the Macedonian media sector and possible future solutions that need to follow the adoption of the Law on Changes and Amendments to the Law on Audiovisual Media Services, prepared this document that aims to open the issue of media ownership, with all the related questions such as transparency of ownership or prevention of media concentration.

This documents aims not to offer a finite list of ready-made solutions, but to identify the main points that need to be discussed and considered, so that they can move to the focus of the future legislative solutions, in the context of ongoing and coming reforms of the media eco-system. Naturally, the future legislative solutions must arise from a comprehensive public debate, with involvement of all stake-holders and the general public, fully taking into consideration the international standards and prevalent global trends in the area of broadcasting/audiovisual media services.

The activities for preparation of the document, in line with MDC’s long-standing practice to collect the opinions and positions of the stakeholders and the expert community on the matter at hand, included a public discussion, held on September 7, 2018, before the final draft is presented. We also sent a questionnaire to a number of representatives of interested parties, as another method of collection of their views and positions on this issue.

This document was prepared with support from the Civica Mobilitas Programme of the Swiss Development and Cooperation Agency (SDC). The contents of this publication is sole responsibility of the Media Development Centre and shall not be understood to represent, in any way or fashion, the views and positions of Civica Mobilitas, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation or implementing organisations.

The document is attached, as printable PDF document, to this article.

Regulation of Media Ownership: Between Concentration and Pluralism