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Alert

President promises to waive licensing fees for community-based and other small media and to allocate government advertising contracts equitably

(AMARC/IFEX) - The following is a 15 March 2007 AMARC press release:

Government promises to eliminate economic barriers to small and community media

On 1 March 2007, the Day of the Journalist, President Daniel Ortega signed an agreement with the Journalists' College (Colegio de Periodistas) to waive, in the case of "small and community media outlets", a broadcast licensing renewal fee. The fee of approximately US$ 2,000 constituted an economic barrier to some smaller media outlets.

Under the same agreement, the government has committed itself to ensuring "the just distribution of government advertising contracts, to benefit small and medium-sized radio stations, television programmes, and electronic media that function at the national level," a positive gesture considering how frequently official advertising contracts are used to reward or punish media throughout Latin America, thereby functioning as an indirect instrument for censorship.

The agreement, which was drafted with the involvement of journalists' labour organisations, also commits the government to creating a fund channelling 20 percent of the contributions made by journalists or their employers to government social welfare and health schemes into a special fund to be used to provide health care and other emergency support to members of the Journalists' College. The fund may amount to as much as US$ 160,000, and will be administered by the College. It will also be used to pay the pensions of retired journalists.