Hungary Media Sale Fuels New Press Freedom Fears
Umer Jamshaid Published September 19, 2018 | 02:19 AM
Budapest, Sept 18 (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 19th Sep, 2018 ) :The latest shake-up in Hungarian media since Prime Minister Viktor Orban's election win in April sparked fresh fears Tuesday about increasing government control over the sector.
Since coming into power in 2010, Orban has transformed the country's public media into a government propaganda organ while allies have steadily bought up swathes of the private media sector.
According to statements published on Monday, Cemp-X media group - which sells advertising space for the independent news-site Index.hu - was sold to buyers who include a governing party politician.
A 50-percent share of the company is now owned by Jozsef Oltyan, a businessman and member of the Christian Democrats, the coalition partner of Orban's right-wing Fidesz party.
Hungarian media reported Tuesday that Oltyan has regularly posted online comments criticising opposition parties and independent media including Index.
According to Agnes Urban, an analyst with the Mertek Media Monitor think-tank, the new owner of Index's sales house now controls the site's advertising revenue stream and, potentially, its editorial line.
"Basically, Index is very vulnerable now, its independence is probably gone," Urban told AFP.
A defiant joint statement signed by several dozen Index journalists vowed to maintain the site's editorial freedom.
"We just want to keep on doing what we have been doing, that is creating a newspaper to the best of our ability, independently from the right-wing, or from the left-wing," it said.
In their own statement, the new owners of CEMP-x Online insisted the deal will not interfere with editorial tasks.
That is also "guaranteed thanks to the publisher's foundation ownership (structure)," according to a statement by the head of the entity that operates the news-site itself.
But in recent years media outlets like Index that covered political scandals have either swiftly gone out of business, or been taken over by government allies and rapidly adopted pro-Orban editorial lines, while receiving lucrative flows of state advertising.
The lopsided media landscape and "restricted" access to information in Hungary was cited by OSCE election observers as part of an "adverse climate" that helped Orban win a third consecutive term as premier in April.
Since the vote, several more government-critical outlets have gone bankrupt or changed hands and, soon after, their editorial stance.
A similar fate likely awaits Index.hu, which Urban predicted would become "financially unsustainable" as an independent outlet.
"Either it becomes a propaganda organ like others before it, and its current staff leave and are replaced, or it will simply be starved, its revenue stream closed down, and the journalists will have to leave anyway," she told AFP.
Related Topics
Recent Stories
HEC reviews curricula for environmental sciences degree programme
ICC Asia looking forward to an action-packed Asia Cricket Week
Yuvraj Singh named ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2024 Ambassador
Greece hands Olympic flame to 2024 Paris Games hosts
Two Kyiv hospitals evacuating over feared Russian strikes
World must act on neurotech revolution, say experts
Charles & Catherine's cancer diagnoses
Champions Alcaraz and Sabalenka through in Madrid Open
King Charles to resume some public duties during cancer treatment: palace
US defense chief announces $6 bn in security aid for Ukraine
Heavy rains cause damage to Spezand-Taftan railway track
Woman stabbed in Israel, attacker killed: police
More Stories From World
-
NFL will allow players to wear Guardian Cap helmets in games
5 hours ago -
Football: German Bundesliga table
5 hours ago -
Football: Italian Serie A result
5 hours ago -
Football: German Bundesliga results
5 hours ago -
US troops to leave Chad in second African state withdrawal
5 hours ago -
Plastics pollution may be solved without production cap: Canada minister
5 hours ago
-
Biden stalls on menthol cigarette ban fearing Black vote backlash
5 hours ago -
Champions Alcaraz and Sabalenka through in Madrid Open
5 hours ago -
6,000 French police to welcome Olympic torch amid bonus boost
6 hours ago -
Taiwan hit by several quakes, strongest reaching 6.1-magnitude
6 hours ago -
'Ballistic' Bairstow stars as Punjab pull off record T20 chase
6 hours ago -
Tennis: ATP/WTA Madrid Open results - 2nd update
6 hours ago