National council punished local channel based on complaint of the mayor of Oleksandriya

On November 30, the National Council for TV and Radio broadcasting issued two official warnings to LLC “TRC “Contact-LTD” from Oleksandria city, Kirovohradska oblast, on two licenses pf the company – as a provider, and for cable broadcasting, “Detector media” reports. These sanctions are the result of unscheduled inspections, conducted by the National Council on request of the city mayor of Oleksandria, Stepan Tsapiuk. The warning on provider licese was issued for not rebroadcasting local channel KTM (TRC “Cable television networks”) and communal channels “UA:First” and “UA:Kultura”, that are part of the universal program package. Also, for re-broadcasting three Russian channels: “Kinohit”, STS, “Kinopremiera”, which are not in the list of foreign programs allowed by the national council for rebroadcasting in Ukraine. The company actually already mended the violation at the time of inspection, but it was sanctioned anyway. The warnings on broadcasting license were issued for absence of cable TV broadcasting based on program concept 2 hours a day, absence of information about name and address of producers of the program "Oleksandriya News", change of format from information-and-entertainment to information only, with absence in the broadcasts cultural, art, and popular science programs, unlicensed broadcasts of foreign series, absence of markings "16+" and the channel logo as these series were broadcasted. Director of TRC “Contact-LTD” Ihor Pedan' acknowledged all violations. To the question of the members of the National council why city mayor was complaining about the company, he answered: “He is our opponent, we are not his supporters. This conflict situation lasts for many years”. The head of the National Council Yuriy Artemenko said that a company is such a conflict situation must follow laws in an more prudently than ever. The owner of TV and Radio Company “Kontakt-LTD” is Oleh Zasko, director of the asset managing company “Agro systema”, the owner of which is the son of former mayor of Oleksandriya and head of Kyrovohradska oblast state administration, Roman Motsnyi. As IMI reported before, in February the editor of newspaper in Kropyvnytskyi city “Pervaya Gorodskaya Gazeta” and website “Utrenniy Gorod” Liudmyla Makey complained about pressure from the city mayor of Oleksandriya (Kirovohradska oblast) Stepan Tsapiuk. According to her, the mayor called her on February 3 and accused her the materials published in her newspaper were paid for by his opponents. In the night on the eve of March 1, unknown people set on fire the premises of local TV and Radio Company “Kontakt-LTD”. One the versions on why this took place was considered by the company administration an attempt to intimidate the journalists of the TV channel which several times covered local high-profile events.