Belarusian TV speaks about Lukashenka 1250 times as much as about opposition

The monitoring “Covering Elections in the Media” showed a disappointing result: there are no even slight signs of free elections.

The first stage of the monitoring “Covering the Presidential Election 2010 in the Belarusian Media” has ended.

Media experts studied 18 mass media outlets, both state-run and independent, hard-copy and Internet, “Nasha Niva” informs.

What concerns independent media, experts don’t have serious complaints. “Nasha Niva” and “Narodnaya Volya” newspapers offer a rather multilateral coverage of the election.

“Kmsomolskaya Pravda” gives much of its attention to Alyaksandr Lukashenka. 82% of the paper’s space intended for the election coverage. Mostly, he is described positively. The other presidential aspirants have only 18% of the space.

“The theme of the presidential election was not a top priority in state-run media. It follows at least from the fact that the election coverage took 2-3 times less time than weather forecasts and 17 times less than sports,” philosopher Ales Antsipenka, a coordinator of the monitoring, says.

State-owned mass media almost didn’t give materials about the signature collecting campaign. Even if the question was raised sometimes, the mood was ironic and humiliating, insulting comparisons were noticed.

“The state-owned media published the materials that created an impression the election is predestined,” Antsipenka said.

“Panorama” TV programme dedicates 0.86% of air time to the election

“Panorama”, the evening news programme on the Belarusian TV, gives only 0.86% of its air time to the presidential election.

Reports about Alyaksandr Lukashenka take 75% of time. The other candidates were mentioned just for several seconds. There were momentary reminders about candidates Nyaklyaeu and Pravalski that took 0.01% of the air time. Thus, reports about Lukashenka in “Panorama” take 1250 as much as reports about the others.

Lukashenka takes 70% and 80% of air time on ONT TV Channel and First Radio Channel. ONT mentioned Ramanchuk and Ryzhkou only one time.

“Sovetskaya Belorussia” newspaper gave as much as 13.6% of the paper’s space to the opposition. However, the opposition members are not described individually and often characterized in a negative way. It’s not possible to set apart any candidate.

Such a picture is hardly be imagined somewhere in the EU. The media there try to provide equal information about all possible candidates ahead of elections.