CASTRIES, St Lucia (CMC) – The St Lucia government says it wants the media here to regulate itself insisting that it does not want to be involved in the exercise.
“There are many FM stations, many television stations operating in St Lucia. They are all competing for a very small market share and I think that has caused some of them to be very aggressive in their programming; to take some risks that…to try to be ahead of the pack and unfortunately that has happened in an environment that has not been regulated,” said Information and Broadcasting Minister Dr James Fletcher.
He said the challenge now for the Kenny Anthony administration “is to try to put in place some sort of regime”.
“Personally, I would like to see the media regulate itself. I am not a big fan of heavy government involvement or heavy state involvement in media regulation because sometimes there is a tendency, a possibility of an overreach,” he said.
The government has said the issue was still being discussed and that the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has solicited comments, suggestions for improvement, and expression of concern on a proposed Draft Broadcasting Authority/Services Bill.
Fletcher said he is hoping that the new legislation would be presented to Parliament soon and that consideration would be given to comments and suggestions on the Bill.
“I think we are at the point now where we should be able to do some cleaning up with the comments we’ve received so that we can take it to the next step and I really would like to see some legislation going to Parliament.”
Meanwhile, the main opposition United Workers party (UWP) has accused the Anthony administration of seeking to stifle press freedom on the island.
