PRAGUE (The Thursday Times) — Tens of thousands of Czechs protested in Prague on Sunday against a government plan to scrap the public media licence fee and fund broadcasters from the state budget, a change critics say would damage their independence and viability.
The front section near the stage in Letná park, which overlooks the Czech capital, filled quickly as crowds clogged nearby metro stations. Many protesters wore pointed hats folded from newspaper, in tribute to the animated character who has introduced Czech Television’s nightly bedtime stories for decades. Organisers had said they expected 400,000 to 600,000 people.
What the bill would do
The coalition government of Prime Minister Andrej Babiš, backed by the far-right SPD and the Motorists party, supports a bill that would cancel the monthly household broadcasting fee of 205 crowns (about $9) that currently funds Czech Television and Czech Radio. The bill has passed a preliminary vote and awaits further debate. A proposed 15% funding cut would bring television’s nominal budget back to its 2008 level and radio’s to its 2005 level, which the broadcasters say is unworkable.
Opposition parties have compared the proposals to changes in Hungary under the former prime minister Viktor Orbán. The European Broadcasting Union, the European Federation of Journalists, Reporters Without Borders, and the International Press Institute have also criticised the plan. The government accuses public and private media of bias and says it is keeping a promise to ease the financial burden on citizens. Babiš has dismissed claims of interference as untrue and said the government will not meddle in editorial work.
Weeks of protest
Staff at public television and radio held a one-day strike earlier in November that led to broadcast curbs, and artists and students have backed the protests. The rally came two days before the 17 November holiday that marks the 1989 Velvet Revolution, which swept away communist rule.
Earlier: Czechs plan mass Prague rally over Babiš bid to scrap public media fee.
