An act to prevent monopolization of the media, proposed by the National Communications Commission (NCC), would require media companies to file an application for a merger to proceed if the matter involves mergers in the broadcasting and print media sector, while the commission would not approve any case in which the media ownership concentration level has reached a specified “ceiling.”
The commission yesterday unveiled the general legal framework of the act, which was titled “The broadcasting media monopolization prevention and diversity preservation act (廣播電視壟斷防制與多元維護法).”
Commission chairperson Howard Shyr (石世豪) said that members of the commission have yet to discuss each article in the act, adding that they would decide when the topic would be listed on their agenda the week after the Lunar New Year holiday.
Photo: Liu Hsin-de, Taipei Times
“Each commissioner has been given a stack of materials about the draft act to read over the holiday,” Shyr said.
Based on Shyr’s presentation, the legislation would tackle monopolization of the media and its negative influence on society through four different aspects: regulating media ownership concentration and cross-media monopolization; preserving the professionalism and independence of news media; facilitating the development of diverse cultures and citizens’ autonomy; and facilitating laws under the jurisdiction of other government agencies.
Shyr said that the commission plans to adopt four different levels to regulate media ownership concentration and cross-media ownership. If the broadcasting media merge among themselves and have any change in management or operations, they would be obligated to file an application for the merger with the commission. The legislation would also regulate mergers in the broadcasting and print media sector.
“However, the commission cannot regulate mergers of newspapers, because the commission is not the administrative agency in charge of newspapers,” Shyr said.
Though a certain merger case might endanger the public interest, Shyr said that the commission might still approve it by adding conditional clauses and ensuring that the parties involved in the case fulfill those clauses.
If the commission ascertains that a merger will definitely jeopardize the public interest and would not lead to normal market development, the government would in principle not approve it, Shyr said.
“The only exception would be that the parties in the mergers agree to the terms set by the commission and be willing to subject themselves to the commission’s follow-up supervision and regulations,” he added.
If a merger would cause the level of media ownership concentration to hit a set ceiling, Shyr said that there would be no need for the commission to investigate the facts of the deal and such a deal would be rejected unconditionally.
“The ‘ceiling’ we will set down will be very specific and will not be bent to accommodate different individual cases,” he said.
Meanwhile, Shyr said that the commission would make sure that the proposed act would complement relevant laws in other government agencies.
The act, he said, would require that broadcast media present information about their operations to the commission to help it make informed decisions on cases.
TENSIONS: The Chinese aircraft and vessels were headed toward the western Pacific to take part in a joint air and sea military exercise, the Ministry of National Defense said A relatively large number of Chinese military aircraft and vessels were detected in Taiwan’s vicinity yesterday morning, apparently en route to a Chinese military exercise in the western Pacific, the Ministry of National Defense (MND) said. In a statement, the ministry said 36 Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) aircraft, including J-16 fighters and nuclear-capable H-6 bombers, crossed the median line of the Taiwan Strait or an extension of it, and were detected in the southern and southeastern parts of Taiwan’s air defense identification zone (ADIZ) from 5:20am to 9:30am yesterday. They were headed toward the western Pacific to take part in a
Honor guards are to stop performing changing of the guard ceremonies around a statue of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) to avoid “worshiping authoritarianism,” the Ministry of Culture said yesterday. The fate of the bronze statue has long been the subject of fierce and polarizing debate in Taiwan, which has transformed from an autocracy under Chiang into one of Asia’s most vibrant democracies. The changing of the guard each hour at the Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall in Taipei is a major tourist attraction, but starting from 9am on Monday, the ceremony is to be moved outdoors to Democracy Boulevard, outside the eponymous blue-and-white memorial
The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) supports peaceful unification with China, and President William Lai (賴清德) is “a bit naive” for being a “practical worker for Taiwanese independence,” former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) said in an interview published yesterday. Asked about whether the KMT is on the same page as the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) on the issue of Taiwanese independence or unification with China, Ma told the Malaysian Chinese-language newspaper Sin Chew Daily that they are not. While the KMT supports peaceful unification and is against unification by force, the DPP opposes unification as such and
CASES SLOWING: Although weekly COVID-19 cases are rising, the growth rate has been falling, from 90 percent to 30 percent, 14 percent and 6 percent, the CDC said COVID-19 hospitalizations last week rose 6 percent to 987, while deaths soared 55 percent to 99, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) said yesterday, adding that the recent wave of infections would likely peak this week. People aged 65 or older accounted for 79 percent of the hospitalizations and 90 percent of the deaths, the majority of whom have or had underlying health conditions, CDC data showed. The youngest hospitalized case last week was a six-month-old, who was born preterm and was unvaccinated, CDC physician Lin Yung-ching (林詠青) said. The infant had a fever, coughing and a runny nose early this month, but