Yesterday, the new proposed bill on Broadcasting was discussed at a second hearing at three parliamentary committees – namely the Legal Affairs, Science, and Sectoral Economy Committees. The debates lasted over four hours, and none of the session leaders managed to hold their ground till the end. After Levan Bezhashvili, chair of the Legal Affairs Committee, the session was led by MPs Niko Lekishvili, Nino Kalandadze, Gia Natsvlishvili… When the presidium was vacated, the function of “conductor” was assumed by MP Giga Bokeria, one of the drafters of the bill.

Although it was tiresome work, the clause-by-clause review of the draft law was neither tense nor controversial. The opposition’s energy was mainly employed in its attempt to divert the discussion to another direction at the beginning of the session. The New Rights offered a political assessment of an incident that took place during a conference organized by the ad hoc committee for public monitoring on December 1. But their statement was not followed with much of a response and the joint session of the three committees soon returned to the issue on the agenda.

Apart from the opposition, Deputy Finance Minister Lasha Gotsiridze also tried to contest the draft law on Broadcasting. According to Gotsiridze, the government thinks it unacceptable to finance public television with a 1.5% income tax. Incidentally, the said sum would be allocated not from local budgets, but from the central one.

The dispute over this issue was not lengthy: the government representative was reminded that the principle of financing public television was supported by parliament at the first hearing.

Presumably, a divergence of opinions would have followed the issue of covering election debates by the holder of a general broadcasting license. In other words, which parties will receive secured airtime during the pre-election period. The problem was easily solved, or, more precisely, it was postponed for the future. An addendum appeared in the bill, according to which “qualified election subjects” would enjoy this right, while the Electoral Code would determine which political forces were implied under the abovementioned term...

After the four-hour-long “battle,” only several MPs, representatives of the media and non-governmental organizations remained on the “battlefield.” This was the reason the committee hearing in the end transformed into a dispute.

A crowning of this process with a vote turned out to be impossible yesterday; it was decided to deem the bill on Broadcasting discussed with a second hearing, while balloting is to separately take place in the committees later on.