(IPYS/IFEX) – On 2 June 2003, the Supreme Court’s (Tribunal Supremo de Justicia, TSJ) Constitutional Chamber refused to grant a petition filed by television stations Globovisión, Televen and RCTV to have several articles of the Telecommunications Law declared unconstitutional. Representatives of the television stations asked the court to strike down Article 171, paragraph 6, which […]
(IPYS/IFEX) – On 2 June 2003, the Supreme Court’s (Tribunal Supremo de Justicia, TSJ) Constitutional Chamber refused to grant a petition filed by television stations Globovisión, Televen and RCTV to have several articles of the Telecommunications Law declared unconstitutional.
Representatives of the television stations asked the court to strike down Article 171, paragraph 6, which permits the withdrawal of broadcasting licenses; Article 183, which grants the National Telecommunications Commission (Comisión Nacional de Telecomunicaciones, CONATEL) the power to suspend a broadcasting media outlet’s signal; and Article 208, paragraphs 1 and 8, which give the executive the power to regulate the content of radio and television transmissions until such time as another law exists to regulate this material.
The Constitutional Chamber ruled that “neither the facts related by the plaintiffs nor an analysis of the articles in question justifies the use of the Constitutional Chamber’s preventive powers.”
The petition was presented to the TSJ on 29 January by lawyers Margarita Escudero León, legal representative of Globovisión, and Gustavo Reyna, Pedro Perera Riera, José González, José Frías and Álvaro Guerrero Hardy, representing RCTV. Televen also supported the petition.
The lawyers stated that Article 208 limits and regulates programming content. It is “unconstitutional,” they argued, that the article “attempts to validate a series of illegalities that limit freedom of expression by regulating the content of broadcast transmissions.”
Articles 208 and 171 were used in January by the Infrastructure Ministry as a basis for launching investigations of RCTV, Globovisión, Televen and Venevisión. The ministry alleged that the stations had violated the articles during the civic strike organised by the political opposition.
The civic strike lasted from 2 December 2002 to 6 February 2003. During this period, private television stations broadcast opposition political propaganda instead of commercials.
The stations’ lawyers had requested that Infrastructure Minister Diosdado Cabello be ordered to refrain from applying the Telecommunications Law and a related law governing television broadcasts (el Reglamento Parcial sobre trasmisiones de Televisión) until the Supreme Court had ruled on their petition.
They also asked that the investigation of the television stations being carried out by the Infrastructure Ministry be transferred to the National Telecommunications Commission (Comisión Nacional de Telecomunicaciones, CONATEL). The request was denied. The Infrastructure Ministry has yet to decide on the matter, which could result in punishment such as the suspension of the stations’ broadcasting licences.
