Reforming media legislation redux

The heads of media organizations and the media appealed to the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Chairman of the Mazhilis of the Parliament of the Republic of Kazakhstan, the Commissioner for Human Rights and members of the National Council of Public Trust.

“We appeal to you since we are concerned about the prospects of national legislation reforms that regulate the limits of freedom of speech. It's a fundamental right. UN General Assembly Resolution No. 59 (I) defines it as  the criterion of all other freedoms.

Back in 2017, Minister of Information Dauren Abayev announced that development of a new draft law "On Mass Media" will begin in 2018. In May 2021, Minister of Information Aida Balayeva told the media that "an absolutely new draft law on mass communications is being developed." However, in the same month, Vice Minister of Information Kemelbek Oyshibaev said in an official letter that the government would still decide "whether it will be a new law or further amendments to the current legislation." On November 8, 2021, at the national conference "What should be the new media law?" held by the civil society, officials did not clarify whether it would a news media law or the old  one yet amended.

We believe that the Law of the Republic of Kazakhstan "On Mass Media", that has been in effect since 1999, is outdated and should be replaced.  167 amendments have been made to it by now, major part of them are aimed at strengthening and expanding the accounting and control functions of state bodies. At the same time, it does not contain specific obligations of the state to ensure the right to freedom of speech, clear conditions for limiting this right in accordance with Art. 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and Art. 39 of the Constitution of the Republic of Kazakhstan,  responsibility for violation of these restrictions, responsibility for unjustified restriction of the right to freedom of speech and other norms that are to be taken into account in the digital era.

Publically available information indicate that the real goal of the legislative amendments developed by the Ministry of Information and Social Development is  to expand the control and accounting functions of the ministry itself, to restrict the public use of the Internet, online TV broadcasting and social networks. These goals cannot be found corresponding to the constitution of the country.

Though 85% of the media are formally private, in reality the main customer of the content is the state. The overall advertising market is about 50 billion tenge, and the state order in the media is twice as large - about 100 billion tenge. This is the highest volume of state support in the Central Asian countries and in many other foreign countries. And it is a serious grounds to introduce  antimonopoly regulation of this industry. At the same time, we often do not have reliable data on the effectiveness of the state order. Judging by public opinion polls, the society does not know much  about the state support programs. Social networks and messengers begin to prevail among  the sources of information that indicates to the low efficiency of the state information order.

Representatives of the country's media community have their own conceptual and specific proposals for balancing competition in the media market, increasing its efficiency and creating an atmosphere of freedom of speech in the country. These proposals  should be included to the draft  law. However, all attempts by civil society to make the draft law development public and collegial and to jointly develop guarantees and limits of freedom of speech are crushed by the ministry's vague promises to do so in an indefinite future. We believe that such a position contradicts the promise to create a listening state, done by the President, and a strong requirement for that is a constant dialogue between the authorities and the society.

We ask you to take special control over the work on the draft  law regulating the media and freedom of speech, in order to ensure its publicity and collegiality. This should start with the development of concepts for reforming media legislation. "

The appeal was signed by President of the International Foundation for the Protection of Freedom of Speech Adil Soz  Tamara Kaleyeva, coordinator of the regional media platform Qalam Karlygash Ezhenova, Director of Legal Media Center PF Diana Okremova, General Director of Vlast.kz Vyacheslav Abramov, Director of Tilshi Public Foundation Askar Aktleuov, Director of the International Center for Journalism MediaNet Adil Jalilov, Chairman of the Board of the Union of Journalists of Kazakhstan Seitkazy Matayev.