Creating a suitable legal framework to reorganize the press system

Discussing the draft Law on Press (amended), National Assembly deputies agreed with the necessity of promulgating the Law because after 16 years of implementation, the Law on Press has revealed many shortcomings and is no longer suitable for reality.

In particular, the strong development of information technology and the popularity of social networks have changed journalism activities in terms of reporting methods, forms of information content transmission and people's access to information.

Can Tho City National Assembly delegate Tran Thi Hong Tham speaks. (Photo: Phuong Hoa/VNA).

The amendment of the Press Law will contribute to concretizing the spirit and content of the 2013 Constitution on freedom of the press and freedom of speech in the press; overcoming limitations and shortcomings in the practical implementation of the Law; creating a suitable legal framework to arrange and reorganize the press system, creating conditions for the press to develop healthily, effectively and in the right direction.

Delegates commented that the draft law submitted to the National Assembly this time has many new points regarding freedom of the press and freedom of speech in the press.

The draft law also expands and specifies the subjects that are allowed to establish press agencies; adds a number of new regulations on press organizations; chooses to legalize the regulations in sub-law documents on information in the press, press cards, representative offices, resident reporters, etc. into the scope of the law to increase the feasibility of the Law.

However, delegate Tran Thi Hong Tham (Can Tho) said that there are still some unclear provisions in the draft Law, which need to be specified and detailed, to avoid delegating too much content to the Government and the Ministry of Information and Communications.

Delegate Ha Minh Hue (Binh Thuan) suggested that the draft Law should continue to be amended to create a legal corridor, create conditions for the press to develop, promote the advantages, creativity, and responsibility of the press, and should not be managed in the direction of tightening activities with many administrative procedures and overly specific instructions.

In addition, delegate Nguyen Phi Thuong (Hanoi) expressed his opinion that the draft law needs to have regulations to provide a "fulcrum" for the development of Vietnamese press to meet the requirements of international integration.

In reality, the Vietnamese press is currently in a difficult situation, not having enough capacity to accumulate and develop on its own. There is a situation of opportunistic business practices, "rehashing" information, stealing each other's information content, etc., making it impossible for the press to confidently stand firm, making it difficult to integrate, especially in performing its ideological function.

Therefore, it is necessary to create a strong enough legal corridor for press agencies to be autonomous and economically successful, avoiding the situation where Vietnamese press cannot compete with foreign media corporations right at home.

The young generation easily adapts to foreign media and turns its back on domestic press if Vietnamese press is not renewed and strengthened.

Commenting on the responsibilities and powers of press agency leaders, some opinions stated that the draft Law needs to be researched and re-regulated in the direction of determining who is primarily responsible, who is jointly responsible, and the level of responsibility of each position for violations in press activities and information content.

Delegate Tran Thi Hong Tham (Can Tho) pointed out that in recent years, press activities have revealed worrying issues, such as not implementing the principles and purposes correctly, misrepresenting the truth, and the trend of commercialization has tended to increase rapidly.

What is worrying is the situation of information meticulously describing obscene acts, crimes, information about mystical stories, superstitions... this contributes to distorting the perception of society, especially of young people.

Delegates suggested that the drafting committee should study and supplement regulations of management agencies and specific sanctions for journalists who do not comply with professional ethics and editors who allow inappropriate information to be published to have sufficient deterrence.

Regarding regulations on representative offices and resident reporters of press agencies, delegate Nguyen Ngoc Phuong (Quang Binh) agreed with the draft Law stipulating that representative offices and resident reporters can only operate locally when approved in writing by the People's Committee of the province or centrally-run city where the representative office is located or the resident reporter is assigned.

According to the delegate, this is a mandatory administrative procedure. If approved by the Provincial People's Committee, it will be convenient for the resident representative. The Provincial People's Committee does not direct or impose and is responsible for creating conditions for the resident reporter to operate. If the resident representative is assaulted or has other incidents, the Provincial People's Committee will protect him.

It also limits the situation of resident reporters taking advantage of their status as journalists to harass and not comply with the provisions of the Law...

The regulation that representative offices and resident reporters must register with the Provincial People's Committee is extremely important. If the provinces do not manage this well, it will be very difficult in the future.

Delegate Ha Minh Hue (Binh Thuan) expressed concern about the regulation that the People's Committees of provinces and centrally-run cities shall implement state management of the press for local press agencies because this regulation seems to add another level of management for press agencies because conflicting information in the locality is easily "whistled" by the locality, and the press will find it difficult to operate freely. This function should be assigned to the managing agency or the press agency with resident reporters, so that decentralization of management will be more reasonable, focused, and effective.

Discussing the regulation: “The head of a press agency is the general director, director; the deputy of the head is the deputy general director, deputy director” - delegate Thuan Huu (Ba Ria-Vung Tau) commented that this regulation can only be applied to multimedia press agencies with many publications, but for small press agencies with only one publication, applying this regulation causes more trouble in the management process...

Also during the meeting, delegates focused on discussing freedom of the press, freedom of speech in the press; prohibited content and behavior in press activities; providing information to the press.../.

According to Vietnamplus