Controversial media law approved in Ecuador conditions freedom of the press

Creating official media overseers, imposing sanctions for smearing “people’s good name” and limiting private media to one third of radio and TV licenses, Ecuador’s congress on Friday passed a restrictive new media law championed by President Rafael Correa.

The country’s privately owned media, which is largely in opposition hands, joined press freedom groups in calling the bill an authoritarian measure to control dissent. It passed by a 108-26 margin in the Correa-controlled congress.

Its sponsor, lawmaker Mauro Andino, said the proposal would protect freedom of speech, but “with a focus on everybody’s rights, not just for a group of the privileged.”

Carlos Lauria, Americas director of the New York-based Committee for the Protection of Journalists, said the legislation “could severely limited freedom of expression” by giving the government ample discretion to sanction dissenters and thus “opens the door to government censorship of the press.”

It “establishes finally one of the key objectives of Correa’s rule, which is to silence critics of his government.”

Diego Cornejo, director of the Ecuadorian Association of Newspaper Editors, said the bill creates “a kind of information totalitarianism,” reflecting a state that “wants to impose only one viewpoint about reality”.

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