Media tremble at NBTC's Section 44 powers

Bangkok Thailand,
By Pirongrong Ramasoota; A teacher at Chulalongkorn University

Just as the days count down until the constitutional referendum on Aug 7, the free speech situation in Thai society may again reach a new low with the latest edict passed by the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO).

NCPO Order No 41/2559, issued under the highly authoritative Section 44 of the interim constitution, addresses the regulation of information disseminated to the public and essentially authorises the country's communications regulator, the National Broadcasting and Telecommunications Commission (NBTC), to exercise broad power, from pulling the plug on a broadcast programme to shutting down an entire station's broadcast without having to be accountable for its actions.

Notably, the NBTC, established in 2011 as a result of the Act to assign frequency and regulation of broadcasting and telecommunications in late 2010, was designed to be an independent regulator whose main mission is to regulate the use of radio frequencies for the public interest, promote free and fair competition, as well as to safeguard people's communication rights.

Insofar as content regulation is concerned, the NBTC has mainly employed the authority endowed upon it within Section 37 of the 2008 Broadcasting Act which prohibits broadcasts of certain types of content (see table) which provides a comparison of content rules as outlined in Section 37 of the Broadcasting Act and Section 3 (1-7) of NCPO Announcement No. 97/2014.

Licenced broadcast operators are urged to screen their own content. Failure to do so could result in suspension of the programme or administrative fines as ruled by the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC), the broadcasting authority within the NBTC. If the problematic broadcast has produced serious damage, the station could face suspension or have its licence revoked. But in the pre-2014 coup period, there has been no record of licence suspensions.

http://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/opinion/1037021/media-tremble-at-nbtcs-section-44-powers