Listening to Rock Radio's opponents

By Aleksander Nowacki

Last week the controversial Radio and Television Regulatory Act came up for second reading in the Sejm amidst loud protests from opposition parties and the private media. With all the hype surrounding the most vilified legislative process in the country's history, even a seemingly insignificant technical issue can come to be hotly debated in the nation's business press.

Rock Radio Mazowsze, a Łomianki-based station broadcasting to several Warsaw suburbs, recently filed an application to move its transmitter from the top of a chimney on the Nowy Dwór power plant to the Palace of Culture in Warsaw. The application was refused by the National Broadcasting Council (KRRiTV), as it would "lead to a significant increase of the station's reach, which would in turn compromise its status as a local broadcaster."

This fact alone hardly justifies the front-page media attention the issue has been receiving in some of the country's largest dailies. But as Rock Radio Mazowsze is owned by media giant Agora, and the application's rejection was inspired by Włodzimierz Czarzasty, KRRiTV's influential secretary widely considered to be an opponent of Agora, the small technical issue suddenly assumes quite different proportions.

"I can't say that I see any logical grounds (for the council's decision)," said Marek Michalski, deputy head of the radio division at Agora. "That is why we are appealing against it. But we have also come up with an alternative proposal." Agora's proposal involves increasing the power of the existing transmitter to cover all the municipalities and districts named in its license, including central and north Warsaw, where the signal is currently very weak.

Dorota Jasłowska, spokeswoman for the KRRiTV chairperson, said that the new proposal aroused controversy among the council members.

"Some members are of the opinion that the principle of locality is an extremely important one," she said. Others, however, did not seem to share those concerns, saying that, barring any technical difficulties, the broadcaster should be allowed to go ahead with its plans, Jasłowska explained.

"It's a dummy of a controversy," Michalski countered. "The station competes with all the Warsaw-based broadcasters. That's why we want identical or similar technical capabilities." He went on to cite the opinion of the technical department director at KRRiTV that objections to the new application were of a "nature other than technical."

Rock Radio Mazowsze representatives are to meet council members on July 10. Most council members were unavailable for comment last week due to their engagement in the Sejm proceedings. Juliusz Braun, the council's recently deposed chairman, told the Business Journal that he would not comment on the issue, as it would be premature to do so before the decision was made and it was in any case a purely technical matter "of little or no interest to the media."

Włodzimierz Czarzasty is thought to be the author of the anti-concentration rules in the Broadcasting Act, commonly referred to as the "anti-Agora legislation." He denies allegations against him of an unfavorable attitude to the company, claiming that during his term at KRRiTV he voted 16 times for Agora's notions, while opposing them 27 times.