Home > 1.3.1.1 Media > UKRAINE - Opinion on the Law on National Referendum
 
 
 
Download file    
 
 
Paragraph 47
 

II. Comments on the test of the law


C. Some specific comments on the concrete articles on the new law on referendum.


6. Referendum campaign.


b) Referendum campaign and mass media.


The requirement of a mass media “equal and impartial treatment” of the referendum process, and the “unbiased and balanced coverage of the positions in favour and against the issue” (Article 7.3.4; see also Article 22.6) is not always easy to guarantee. It is a difficult task if it is considered in any type of media, as it seems to be the case in Article 75.1 (“The referendum process shall be covered in mass media of any ownership type… in compliance with the principles of objectivity, impartiality and balanced coverage”). All media should try to be objective, with regard to facts. And the social pluralism, combined with the freedom of speech and press, implies that public-owned media have to (try, at least, to be) also impartial and balanced, as far as they are funded by public means and, therefore, they “belong” to the public opinion, where there are different opinions, as the very organisation of the referendum shows. The principle of impartiality (or, better to say, of equal treatment) may also be applied to the conditions of paid publicity (i.e.: advertisements should not be more expensive for different subjects in the same media), as it is provided for with relation to the use of buildings (premises).