Albania

[AL] Changes on the Law for Radio and Television Planned

IRIS 2006-3:1/13

Hamdi Jupe

Albanian Media Monitoring Center

The Government of the Republic of Albania decided on 8 February 2006 to change the law “On public and private radio and television in the Republic of Albania”. Under the amendments to the law the legal mandate of the Këshilli Kombëtar i Radiotelevizioneve (The National Council of Radio and Television), the responsible authority for licensing monitoring of the activity of the public and private radio and television in the country, is interrupted. Also for the members of the current Këshilli Drejtues i Radiotelevizionit Publik (The Directorate Council of the Public Radio and Television) the term of office will end sooner than expected.

It is planned that new members for both Councils will be elected by the Parliament and that the number of Council members will be reduced to almost half. The Prime Minister declared that this decision had been taken by the Government “in the framework of reforms to reduce the number of workers in public administration”.

The law “On public and private radio and television in the Republic of Albania” was adopted in 1999 and has often been often amended, latterly in 2003 (see IRIS 2003-4: 5).

The main opposition party in the Albanian Parliament considered the new draft-law as a tendency of the Government to place the electronic private and public media under its control.