Skopje, 9 April 2019 – The Agency for Audio and Audiovisual Media Services prepared the Second Monitoring Report on the Media Coverage of the 2019 Presidential Elections, which refers to the period from 7 until 31 March, 2019. The report analyzes the 24-hour programme of MRT1, MRT2, MR1 and the Albanian-language programme of the Channel of the Ethnic Communities aired by the Macedonian Radio, as well as 11 TV stations at the state level.
During this reporting period, the monitoring of the manner of reporting prior to the start of the election campaign detected violation of the professional standards for performing the business activity on the part of Sonce TV. Namely, the broadcaster allocated more airtime to the party of the Macedonian Alliance in its newscasts than it did to all other political entities (parties and candidates) together, thus violating Article 61, Paragraph 1, Indents 9 and 13, of the Law on Audio and Audiovisual Media Services, i.e. the principles of providing equal treatment of the diverse views and opinions, and of the autonomy, independence and responsibility of the editors, journalists and other authors in creating the programmes and making the editorial policy.
Half of the total airtime of the newscasts of the Albanian-language programme of the Macedonian Radio was dedicated to conveying information about the daily activities of the Government.
Prevailing among the news items related to the elections were those informing about the activities of the State Election Commission, while the coverage in the daily information programmes reflected the daily flow of events of current interest in the spheres of politics, economy, social affairs, healthcare, etc.
The second report on the media coverage of the 2019 Presidential Elections is available at this link.