Media bill under legislative deliberation

In justifying the bill, Thida Tin, deputy director general of the Information and Public Relations Department, said on Friday that the idea behind the draft legislation was to ensure that state media service operated as a non-profit organisation. 

“The reason why regional public service newspapers are not popular in other countries is the failed attempt of turning commercial outlets into public service ones. Their growth comes to a halt because they are not profit-driven anymore. In fact public service media is founded on the principle of keeping the people informed. It is not driven by profit and there is no chance of a media monopoly emerging,” Thida Tin said. 

The bill was drafted at the advice of local and foreign media experts to prevent media market domination, she said. 

“Around the world, there have been incidents which commercial newspapers gain market domination of private as well as the public service outlets. There is no case of the public service media monopolising the market. This is the reason the government-supported public service media should be set up to ensure fair competition,” she said. 

She was speaking at the press conference for local and foreign journalists organised by the Ministry of Information to explain the bill.