“The main innovations include the introduction of on-line publications, the consecration of collective entities’ right to respond and the right to clarification, and the participative function carried out by the media in the country’s economic and social development has been highlighted,” explains the government minister.
Janira Hopffer Almada also explained the freedom of the press remains guaranteed. “Our main concern was to reinforce freedom of the press, but there must also be a wise balance between freedom of the press and other rights such as the right to one’s good name, privacy rights and copyrights.”
According to the cabinet minister, “there are constitutionally consecrated limits regarding freedom of the press.” “I am free to express myself, as long as I remain aware that there are other rights that may be restricted if my actions are not endowed with due consideration and forethought. Strengthening freedom of the press, but also guaranteeing respect for other fundamental rights, is assured in this revision.”
The journalist’s statute may also come to be revised, if the proposal approved by the Council of Ministers passes in parliament. Among the alterations is “a series of functions that are incompatible with the profession,” says the minister. “We have gone into greater detail in the realm of professional confidentiality and we have allowed journalists to play a decisive role and participate in the editorial process of the media outlet in which they work, and we have better specified journalists’ right to access information.”
The television and radio law may also undergo alterations, given that “the main innovation has been the opening of public television and radio service rights to private collective entities.” Currently, the law only allows collective entities of mostly or exclusively public capital to provide this service. “The government proposes to open this possibility up to the private sector.”
The press and news agency law will also undergo an alteration in terms of “the civil and criminal accountability of those who carry out offenses using these media.” “This includes electronic publications, which will from now on be included in this new law, and responsibility will be shared by the author of the practice or offense and those responsible for the media outlets themselves,” explains Hopffer Almada.
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