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HUNGARY
I. Protests
against ruling on language use.
According to a recent decision by the Romanian National
Audiovisual Council, every audiovisual programme made in
minority languages—including dispatches from various
scenes and live programmes—must be translated
[dubbed or subtitled] into Romanian. The decision
sparked off outrage among editors of minority-language
programmes and ethnic Hungarian politicians.
[Reporter]
The compulsory translation applies to feature and
documentary films, children’s’ programmes,
interviews as well as dispatches from outside Romania.
[Zsolt Galfalvi, Romanian Television board
member, in Hungarian]
One of the ruling’s points makes Hungarian or other
non-Romanian programmes possible if they are translated
immediately into Romanian. Practically, this means
the end of live programmes.
[Reporter]
Hungarian and German-language minority programmes on the
Romanian public service television have already been
subtitled for two years. According to Zsolt
Galfalvi, this is absolutely normal because in this way
they can be understood by non-Romanian speakers as
well. The new ruling, however, is considered by
many to be a discriminative measure.
[Galfalvi]
If it helps to attract and increase the number of
viewers, there is no problem with it. The problem
is caused by the intention of restricting the possibility
of making programmes in our own language.
[Reporter]
The decision has also been criticized by Bela Marko,
chairman of the Hungarian Democratic Union of Romania
[UDMR].
[Marko]
A few days ago the Audiovisual Council took a
discriminative decision on the use of languages in
television broadcasts. This is unacceptable for us.
[Reporter]
Song excerpts, foreign language lessons and news
programmes broadcast in minority-language programmes are
exempt from the rules and do not apply to non-Romanian
satellite programmes transmitted by cable. However,
translation into Romanian language or dubbing is
compulsory for TV programmes produced by cable TV
companies.
Since the
ruling takes effect only after its publication in the
Romanian official gazette, those affected have announced
that they will do everything possible to prevent the
council from approving the final text in this form.
Duna TV satellite
service, Budapest, March 1, 1999
II. PM wants
review of radio-TV system.
Prime Minister Viktor Orban dealt with three issues in
his usual Wednesday morning [24th February] statement [to
Hungarian radio]. Janos Hollos has interviewed
Prime Minister Viktor Orban.
[Hollos]
The Supreme Court has ruled that the National Radio and
Television Body [ORTT] must annul the contract it signed
with the [Hungarian subsidiary of the German] television
company RTL. One would think that such a thing is
almost unthinkable in cases that involve 8bn forints,
14bn forints—the cost of a commercial TV frequency.
[Orban]
If the law demands that such an action should be taken,
if the court rules that this was the situation [that the
granting of the licence to RTL was illegal], then the
decision must be implemented.
[Q]
To put it perhaps a bit bluntly, it can cause an
international scandal.
[A]
Well, I am looking forward with great interest to the
views of media experts, lawyers, the parliamentary
cultural committee and the positions by members of the
government. To be sure, some time ago, in late
November or December, I already wrote to the cultural
committee’ s chairman asking him to start a
six-party consultation to resolve the impossible
situation of television broadcasting [in Hungary] and to
enable the rescuing of public service TV companies, which
are in a tight situation—although at the time I had
mainly in mind the public service TV companies.
So, I think
that the current Supreme Court ruling is another argument
in favour of a review by Hungarian parliament of the
Hungarian radio and television system, including, by the
way, the legal status of the ORTT too, to amend the
law—in agreement with the opposition if possible
because the media law is a two-thirds-majority
law—in line with the accumulated experience.
Hungarian Radio,
Budapest, February 24, 1999
III. Row
continues over commercial RTL TV licence.
Hungary’s Supreme Court passed a legally-binding
verdict on [22nd February], establishing that the
National Radio and Television Board (ORTT) should
terminate its broadcasting contract with Magyar RTL Rt
immediately.
The court
declared that ORTT proceeded illegally when it accepted
the formally invalid bid submitted by Magyar RTL Rt for
one of the terrestrial commercial channels, concluded a
broadcasting contract with the company and deviated from
the rules of evaluation specified in the invitation for
bids.
Court
proceedings were initiated in 1997 by the First Hungarian
Commercial Television Rt, which participated in the
bidding under the name Irisz TV. The proceedings
were initiated against ORTT, and the two winners of the
bidding, the US-German-Hungarian MTM-SBS Televizio Rt
(TV2) and the German-Hungarian Magyar RTL Rt (RTL Klub).
With its
verdict, the Supreme Court has altered the 25th March
1998 ruling of the Metropolitan Court, which dismissed
the action of Irisz TV. For the commercial channel
of RTL Klub, a new competition will probably be invited.
MTI news agency,
Budapest, February 22, 1999
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