LEGAL
OPEN SKIES Satellite broadcasting can deliver clear, uniform signals across the entire Middle East region. However, the laws and regulations guiding the industry can be unclear and their boundaries blurred, writes Sonya Shaykhoun. 034 MARCH 2010
T
he MENA satellite TV industry owes its success in part to the Gulf War, which began on January 1991, a time when a spate of MENA-oriented satellite TV channels and, indeed, TV platforms appeared. For example, the Egyptian-government owned Egyptian Radio and Television Union (ERTU) bought space capacity on a previously unused transponder to broadcast programs on a channel that would become the Egyptian Space Channel. Orbit, (now Orbit Showtime Network), launched from Rome in 1994 and the Middle East Broadcasting Centre (MBC) launched in London in 1991. Now there are reportedly more than 400 channels transmitting in the MENA region via satellite, including a slew of Western channels such as CNN and France TV, a significant increase from the 13
channels that were in operation in 1993. Satellite TV broadcasting regulation did not develop at the same pace as the commercial industry in MENA and as such, satellite channels and platforms, many of which are privately owned, escaped blanket censorship to a large extent and a new era of more open political discussion and debate in Arab broadcasting was born. Notwithstanding the lack of formal censorship of satellite TV, the Saudi-owned channels of MBC and ART all engaged in self-censorship, although there are exceptions, such as the notoriously uncensored Al Jazeera. Not all satellite channels have escaped censorship. “Jamming”, typically a deliberate action affecting the immediate geographical area of the transmitter’s range, is a term that describes the transmission of radio or TV signals disrupting the www.digitalproductionme.com