OSCE Project Co-ordinator in Ukraine supports draft amendments to the law on privatization of state-owned and municipal press

Draft amendments to Ukraine’s Law on the Privatization of State–owned and Municipal Print Press were presented by lawyers of the State Committee for Television and Radio Broadcasting of Ukraine (SCTRBU), the Ukrainian Association of Media Business (UAMB), the Centre for Democracy and Rule of Law (CEDEM) and the Human Rights Platform NGONGO
non-governmental organization on 24 May 2017 in Kyiv, concluding a process supported by the OSCE Project Co-ordinator in Ukraine.

The amendments were developed based on practical cases accumulated via an online assistance system that functioned throughout 2016 with the OSCE Project Co-ordinator’s support, whereby lawyers provided media outlets with free legal advice on how to deal with the ongoing reforms to the media industry.

The suggested amendments address concerns raised by the media outlets such as:

• The inaction of local authorities in authorizing media outlets’ decisions to reform from state to private ownership;
• The interference of local authorities in the staffing structure and personnel policies of the media outlets that want to reform, in particular the dismissal of the editor-in-chief;
• The infringement upon the property of editorial offices that are willing to reform.

The draft law was made public and the suggested amendments thoroughly discussed at the 24 May hearing organized by the Committee of the Verkhovna Rada on Freedom of Speech and Information Policy.

The stakeholders agreed to join efforts to submit their amendments to the draft law to the Verkhovna Rada (national parliament) of Ukraine for the earliest possible adoption.   

The draft law was elaborated under the project “Support for Reforming State and Municipal Print Media”, which has been implemented by the OSCE Project Co-ordinator in Ukraine at the request of the SCTRBU since 2016.