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Átlátszó fights to expose public media spending

May 22, 2013
Blog
Hungarian Media Monitor

Amid steady budget increases and cuts to public media staff, Hungary’s public media management fund, the MTVA, has been outsourcing production to private firms with close ties to Hungary’s ruling Fidesz party, according to an ongoing investigation by pro-transparency investigative reporting NGO, Átlátszó. The group, which has been working to uncover the MTVA’s spendings since 2011, has published a series of reports based primarily on leaked documents that detail the MTVA’s outside contracts with Government-linked private companies and individuals to produce programs for Hungary’s public media.

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Media Council issues first fine on a print daily

May 22, 2013
Blog
Hungarian Media Monitor
By Judit Barta Hungary's Media Council on May 8 handed down its first sanction against a print and online publication with a HUF 250,000 (EUR 862) fine for hate speech against right-wing daily Magyar Hírlap for publishing Zsolt Bayer’s January 5 opinion piece, in which he called Roma “animals” who “shouldn’t be allowed to exist.”

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Human Rights Watch: Hungarian media face political pressure

May 16, 2013
Hungarian Media Monitor
Blog

Independent media outlets in Hungary practice self-censorship as a result of unclear regulations and declines in public and private advertising revenue, according to a new report published by Human Rights Watch.

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Atlatszo: "The coming dark age of democratic governance in Hungary"

May 8, 2013
Hungarian Media Monitor
Blog
"A recent amendment to the law on freedom of information all but ensures that the Government operates in complete darkness," says pro-transparency investigative reporting NGO, Atlatszo.

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Study: Government gives key ad revenue to Hungary's right-wing media

May 8, 2013
Hungarian Media Monitor
Blog

State advertising revenue  of right wing media was more than two times higher in 2012 than in 2010. The state's spending on advertising in  Hungary's print media is directed to a small group of government institutions and firms. The changes in the advertisement incomes of left and right wing leaning printed media follows closely the change's of governments. The advertising incomes of the leftist printed media had dramatically been decreasing from 2008, so that this sum had been reduced to less than one third of 2003 by 2012.

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