The Civic Coalition Lower House caucus promptly made it clear that a bill to decriminalize libel is already being considered by the Criminal Law Committee, co-sponsored by Kirchnerite lawmakers such as Diana Conti and Héctor Recalde.
“I doubt there has ever been a time when it has been possible to speak with more liberty” than under the current administration, Fernández de Kirchner added. “I challenge any historian, any memory, any proof, that there hasn’t been more liberty to speak than under the authority of this government,” she said.
The opposition has once again yesterday pointed out that there is no need to look back to find threats to freedom of speech and of the press but to the media media bill the government is going out of its way to pass through Congress as soon as possible.
At a press conference held by national deputies from the UCR Radical Civic Union and Unión-PRO, the coalition that comprises dissident Peronists and followers of Buenos Aires Mayor Mauricio Macri, Radical National Deputy Silvana Giúdici — head of the Lower House’s Freedom of Speech Committee — pledged to “put a limit” to “the government’s intention of muzzling the media that criticize the administration.”
National Deputy Federico Pinedo, head of the PRO caucus in the Lower House, remarked that the bill to amend the current broadcasting law “covers up a big private business deal supported by the government.”
According to Pinedo, the bill’s clause that allows phone companies to enter the cable TV market is tailor-made to suit only one of them, Telecom Argentina, keeping aside its competitor Telefónica de Argentina. The centre-right lawmaker implied that a recent decision by the country’s defense of the competition watchdog, whereby Italy’s Telecom should sell its shares in the local company is aimed at favouring local businessmen friendly to the Kirchner administration.
Unión-PRO National Deputy Francisco de Narváez yesterday argued that former president Néstor Kirchner “has set up a corrupt system to raise funds and extort,” adding that the media bill is aimed at spreading “biased information and silencing the press.”
Also Civic Coalition and Socialist lawmakers have voiced their concern that if Telecom is allowed to offer cable TV not only big cable operators — like Cablevisión and Multicanal, owned by Grupo Clarín — will be affected but also small- and medium-sized provincial companies that will disappear unable to compete against the multimedia giant.
At a press conference, National Deputy Adrián Pérez, head of the Civic Coalition caucus in the Lower House, said the bill is “a tool to control the media,” adding that the government “will establish a big multimedia through Telecom.”
Also yesterday, at another press conference, the Socialist Party lawmakers announced that its lawmakers will not vote the bill favourably as it stands, although they called for reforms and remarked that it does favour the passing of a new broadcasting law, drastically different to the government’s bill.
But the chorus of complaints has not been enough to conceal disagreements among the partners of the Social and Civic Accord (the alliance of  Radicals, Socialists, the Civic Coalition and Cobos’ ConFe party).
So far, the Accord has not produced a single joint statement regarding the media reform  bill. Instead, the Socialists and the Civic Coalition held two separate press conferences to voice their criticism, while the Radicals teamed up with top officials and lawmakers of Unión-PRO twice in less than 24 hours.
They first met on Thursday evening, when Cobos, Senator Ernesto Sanz and National Deputy Oscar Aguad — heads of the UCR Upper and Lower houses caucuses, respectively — met with De Narváez and Macri, among others, and again yesterday morning, when Radical and Unión-PRO lawmakers faced the press elbow to elbow to criticize the government’s bill.
Likewise, Socialist Senator Rubén Giustiniani remarked at yesterday’s press conference that even though he will not support the government, waiting until after December 10 — when lawmakers elected on June 28 will be sworn in — to vote on the issue “is the alibi of those who don’t want a debate and don’t want a new law.” Many Accord and Unión-PRO legislators have embraced the position rejected by Giustiniani.
The Civic Coalition also distanced itself from its Radical partners by not sending any lawmaker to the Thursday meeting hosted by Cobos, which a coalition source portrayed as “risky” for the institutions on Thursday.

         — With news agencies

Stolbizer sends letter to allies Deputy-elect Margarita Stolbizer, the head of the GEN party, yesterday urged other leaders of the Social and Civic Accord (ACyS) to delay discussions about potential candidacies. Stolbizer also urged Elisa Carrió to halt her plans to turn the Civic Coalition into a single party. Stolbizer sent an open letter to Carrió, Senator Gerardo Morales and Senator Rubén Giustiniani asking them “to postpone the discusion about candidacies and establish rules, with respect to indentities and the autonomy of each one of the parties that are part of the front.” Carrió recently announced plans to turn the Civic Coalition, of which Stolbizer’s GEN is a member, into a single party. But Stobizer’s GEN last week said at a convention it was not willing to belong to a party that also includes Deputy Patricia Bullrich, the head of the Unión por Todos party that is also a member of the Civic Coalition.