The Venezuelan parliament, where Hugo Chavez’s supporters have a majority, set up working commissions to adapt the country’s Law for the Exercise of Journalism “to the new reality,” an intention disputed by professionals.
Professionals warn that the reform will generate more restrictions on the practice of journalism, with the National Association of Journalists (CNP, the entity in charge of granting the professional card) denouncing that it has not been consulted and calling its approximately 25,000 members to protest. against changing the law.
“The review is always necessary, especially in these times. The law dates back to the time when journalism was done with ‘typography’ (typewriters) and the edition had to be closed at midnight because then there was no way to print. The time has changed. and journalism is much faster, much more inclusive,” the vice president of the Permanent Commission of Popular Power and Communication explained to Venezuelan state television.
Carola Chávez also stressed that “in these times of change it is necessary to review the laws and the Journalism Law, an exercise that is so fundamental for society.”
On the other hand, he explained that the law must include “all the areas where journalism is practiced”, because “it goes beyond those who have gone through university”, and that “a law cannot be made only for graduate journalists “, when in society There are different ways of practicing journalism.
Despite the little information available on the reform, the president of the CNP, Tinedo Guía, has already warned that “the main consequence of the reform of the law is control.”
“Control people, avoid controversy, that they only say what is in the State’s interest, that they impose or punish with what they understand, for example, that they apply the Law Against Hate.”
On the other hand, according to Andrés Cañizález, director of Medianalysis, with the reform of the law, “the model of misinformation and censorship that exists today in Venezuela” will be maintained, with the people being the main losers.
The director of the NGO Espacio Público, Carlos Correa, warns that “after what has changed in recent years, there is no guarantee that a legislative initiative is intended to promote journalism and favor the working conditions of journalists.”
“The exercise of journalism faces great difficulties in Venezuela, such as access to information, the stigmatization of the work of journalists in state media (…) there is no reason to think that this legislative reform will be different from what we have faced in the past. recent years,” he told reporters.
In a statement, the CNP announced that it was not consulted on the reform of the law and called on “the more than 25,800 members” to protest, with the aim of “not changing” the spirit “of the Law that 50 years ago provided for the advance of a communicational hegemony, private or state, promoted by ignorance, ideological blindness or interests alien to the Venezuelan people.
According to the CNP, there are journalists linked to the spheres of power “who in times of persecution, harassment, arbitrary detention of colleagues and closure of media outlets, turned their backs on this reality.”
“In the last 20 years, the journalistic union has seen the drastic reduction of independent media, the closure of opinion spaces, the establishment of a culture of systematic concealment of public information, all this without the voice of the so-called institutions being raised. to defend democracy,” the statement read.
According to the CNP, journalists in Venezuela have become “a kind of enemy and factor of war.”
The CNP also explains that in 1994 a reform of the law was carried out and that “the spirit, the object and the raison d’être of the current legislation have remained intact.”
Source: TSF
Roy Brown is a renowned economist and author at The Nation View. He has a deep understanding of the global economy and its intricacies. He writes about a wide range of economic topics, including monetary policy, fiscal policy, international trade, and labor markets.
