ZAGREB, Sept 17 (Hina) - The Mission of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to Croatia issued a statement on Wednesday stating it hoped the decision to allocate the frequency of the third national television
channel to a private bidder would promote the private broadcasting sector in Croatia and introduce healthy competition to the national television scene.
ZAGREB, Sept 17 (Hina) - The Mission of the Organisation for
Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to Croatia issued a
statement on Wednesday stating it hoped the decision to allocate
the frequency of the third national television channel to a private
bidder would promote the private broadcasting sector in Croatia and
introduce healthy competition to the national television scene.
#L#
The Council for Radio and Television on Tuesday granted a 10-year
concession for the third national channel to the HRTL consortium,
which is comprised of the media corporation RTL, Agrokor,
HVP/Splitska Bank, Podravka, Atlantic grupa, and Pinta TV 3.
The decision was adopted with the majority of votes, after "a
bidding procedure that appeared to be transparent", Mission head
Peter Semneby said in the statement.
"This will hopefully contribute to the pluralism of the television
market in Croatia and benefit the Croatian public through a wider
variety of views in television news programming."
"We are satisfied with the openness of the selection procedure,
regardless of who was eventually awarded the tender," Semneby
said.
The OSCE Mission has long recommended privatisation of the third
national television channel under an open and transparent process.
This was also an expert recommendation to the Croatian government
when Croatia entered the Council of Europe in 1996, Semneby said.
(hina) rml