"It is time to wake up to a responsibility of the public powers" in the face of the crisis of the media, defended last night the President of the Republic, at the closing of the conference on Media Financing, for which the director of Sul Informação was invited as one of the speakers.
Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa also suggested that the State implement, as early as 2020, at least some experimental measures to support the media.
"It is time to agree to a responsibility of public authorities, but not, in 2020, initially, experimentally, tentatively, waiting for the strategy that does not exist and for an overall vision for the following years", underlined the President, at the closing of the conference promoted by the Union of Journalists, in response to an appeal from him and with his sponsorship, and which took place at Palácio da Cidadela, in Cascais.
The head of state gave the example of the support measures in force in other European countries, which consider the media as a fundamental pillar of democracy, even calling for greater intervention by citizens, since “either civil society acts or public authorities they will not feel the urge to act, because the invocation of budgetary limits is eternal, limits that are more evident for sensitive social domains for the common of citizens, from health to security, from combating poverty to education».
«Everything that civil society can, therefore, launch, encourage, raise, from the reorganization of media groups with or without a foundation structure, to the mobilization of patronage for subscriptions or stimuli and support for the media, and immediately to reading, going through civic action with an impact on the tax system or transversal solidarities in public campaigns is welcome», he considered.
And, as for those “who think they are escaping the crisis and its effects of all kinds”, the President of the Republic told them that “they will not escape”, sooner or later.
The head of state also pledged, in front of a room full of journalists, directors of newspapers and media groups, researchers and others interested in the topic, not to make "the mistake of being silent, of pretending that there is no crisis" in the media in Portugal, nor “to adhere to the inertia of taking as natural the omission of civil society and public authorities” and, on the contrary, to continue “to raise the issue, always, and to support all, but even all, avenues complementary to its overcoming”.
In the closing session, before the President of the Republic, Adelino Gomes, who presented a summary of the key ideas discussed during the two days of the conference, and Sofia Branco, president of the Union of Journalists, took the floor.
In the afternoon, at the panel on funding in the Regional Press, Elisabete Rodrigues presented the case of Sul Informação, a newspaper that “assumes itself, since its foundation, as only and only online” and that bets on “free access content” and lives off advertising and “generous donations from its readers”.
Photos: Presidência da República
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