US embassy cable - 05TAIPEI3344

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 TAIPEI 003344 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/10/2015 
TAGS: ECPS, PGOV, PHUM, TW, Human Rights/TIP, Domestic Politics 
SUBJECT: TAIWAN'S GIO DEFENDS BROADCAST LICENSING POLICY 
 
Classified By: AIT Director Douglas Paal, Reasons 1.4 b/d 
 
1.  (C) Summary: Taiwan's Government Information Office 
insists its July 31 decision not to renew seven television 
broadcast licenses was justified by these broadcasters 
violations of licensing terms spelled out in the 1999 
Satellite Broadcasting Law.  GIO dismissed allegations that 
the decision came as a surprise to broadcasters, noting that 
the review process had begun in March 2005 with notification 
and request for documents from broadcasters.  However, the 
review process for license renewal was not transparent and 
some news broadcasters appear to have received preferential 
treatment.  Despite the charges of opposition parties and 
media critics that GIO's actions are politically motivated 
and constitute a setback to Taiwan's press freedom, GIO has 
no plans to make public the record of the deliberations.  GIO 
refuted suggestions that the decision had been influenced by 
political pressure or that one news channel had been told to 
stop broadcasting in order to make room for a more 
government-friendly channel to take its place.  GIO believes 
the long-awaited arrival of the National Communications 
Commission and an expected new broadcasting law mean that the 
controversy created by this decision will soon be someone 
else's problem.  End Summary. 
 
2.  (U) AIT Econoff met Taiwan Government Information Office 
(GIO), Department of Broadcasting Affairs Deputy Director 
Tseng Yi-hung on August 9 to discuss the controversy created 
 
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by the GIO decision announced July 31 not to renew the 
licenses of seven Taiwan broadcasters.  The GIO decision 
effectively forced these stations to cease operations on 
August 2, giving them less than 48 hours to prepare their 
staffs and the public for their imminent closure.  The 
announcement set off a chorus of criticism from academics, 
political commentators, and the Taiwan media that the GIO was 
suppressing free speech, should not have licensing authority, 
and was engaged in political manipulation of the media.  The 
GIO decision also prompted statements of concern from 
international press freedom organizations including 
"Reporters without Borders." 
 
============================================ 
GIO Authority/Process for Reviewing Licenses 
============================================ 
 
3. (SBU) Tseng rejected allegations made by some critics of 
GIO's decision that there was no statutory authority for 
broadcast licenses to be reviewed.  The 1999 Satellite 
Broadcasting Law, he countered, requires GIO to issue 
licenses valid for six years.  The first batch of 84 licenses 
issued under that Law were released August 2, 1999.  These 84 
broadcasters then faced expiration of their licenses as of 
August 2, 2005.  An additional 60 plus licenses have been 
approved since 1999 and will face the same type of license 
renewal review as they expire.  Of these original 84, 14 did 
not submit applications for renewal.  In March 2005, GIO 
requested that the remaining 70 broadcasters provide 
information reviewing their activities over the past six 
years, their business plans, mission statements, descriptions 
of their broadcast content, financial statements and 
descriptions of contracts with satellite and cable operators, 
ownership profiles and their records regarding compliance 
with Taiwan broadcast standards.  According to Tseng, these 
requirements are consistent with those required for initial 
licensing and are spelled out in the Satellite Communication 
Law. 
 
4.  (SBU) The information provided by the broadcasters was 
passed to the GIO License Review Committee.  This Committee 
is composed of 12 members, primarily academics, appointed by 
the GIO Director for a period of one year.  Although 
appointed by the Director of GIO, committee members are 
supposed to be politically neutral.  The License Review 
Committee then arbitrarily assigned points to each category 
of information supplied by broadcasters, totaling a maximum 
of 100 points. 
 
5.  (SBU) 23 broadcasters received cumulative scores below 70 
points.  Of these, the lowest 18 were invited to appear 
before the committee to address particular shortcomings. 
Several were asked to supply additional information.  Others, 
primarily news broadcasters, were required to program a 
weekly public forum with station management that would serve 
as a public feedback mechanism to encourage broadcasters to 
improve the quality of their programming.  According to 
Tseng, GIO has the authority under Article 37 of the 
 
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Satellite Broadcasting Law to suspend a broadcast license for 
up to three months for certain violations.  Under this 
provision, these stations will be subject to monthly reviews 
and required to implement this "self-discipline" program for 
a minimum of three months as a condition of retaining their 
broadcasting licenses.  If a broadcaster is found to be out 
of compliance during that time, its license will be revoked. 
 
============================================= ======= 
Stations Closed for Violating Morals, Business Plans 
============================================= ======= 
 
6.  (C) Of the 23 stations that did not meet the arbitrary 
70-point standard, 12 were asked to conduct the 
"self-discipline" measures described above.  Four were 
re-issued licenses and seven were refused license renewal. 
The License review committee offered several reasons why 
licenses were not renewed, said Tseng.  One broadcaster, Ou 
Peng Entertainment Network, was in violation of its original 
business plan and devoted too much air time to commercials, 
according to Tseng.  Another, ETTV-S -- a news station 
affiliated with the large Eastern Media Group -- had its 
renewal application rejected on the grounds that it was the 
third largest violator of GIO regulations and, contrary to 
its application, its programming was only 59% news, with the 
other 41% consisting of entertainment and commercial related 
programming.  Another channel, the Long Shong Movie Channel 
was allegedly refused due to a poor financial situation (an 
accusation denied in the press by Long Shong management), and 
a fourth, Rainbow Television, known for showing programs 
advertising dating services for foreign brides and soft-core 
pornography, was rejected on moral grounds. 
 
7. (C) Although rumors suggest the decision not to renew 
licenses fell disproportionately on pro-Blue stations, and 
several high-ranking Directors of Eastern Multimedia Group 
are former officials in the KMT government, there is no 
indication that these station's ownership groups are 
uniformly anti-government, nor are they generally actively 
critical of the Chen government.  When asked why, of all the 
stations slated for closure, only Tainan-based Ou Peng was 
not given an interview, Tseng replied that there was no 
statutory requirement to do so and the Committee members 
believed an interview was unnecessary.  Those broadcasters 
forced to close can appeal the GIO decision to the Executive 
and Judicial Yuans.  He noted that ETTV-S had already filed a 
case in the Taipei court that he expected would result in an 
injunction hearing by August 16. 
 
=============================== 
GIO Denies Fubon/Green Pressure 
=============================== 
 
8.  (C) Responding to questions regarding political pressures 
to refuse to renew licenses and the alleged connection 
between the pro-government Fubon Group's application on 
August 3 to establish a news channel and the cancellation of 
Eastern Media's ETTV-S, Tseng insisted that the GIO staff was 
unaware that Fubon planned to submit an application.  Fubon's 
application will be processed by the GIO License Committee in 
the same fashion as any other license application, Tseng 
said.  He dismissed suggestions that the government was 
trying to make room for a pro-Green news channel, noting that 
the broadcast channels are assigned by the cable companies, 
with GIO concurrence.  A cable company could assign a 
Fubon-sponsored news broadcast to whatever channel it wished; 
GIO would not be likely to challenge the decision unless 
there was some public interest at stake. 
 
9.  (SBU) Tseng noted that ETTV-S's channel had already been 
filled by a broadcaster called "Super X."  Because of the 
sudden nature of the stop-broadcast order, GIO was allowing 
cable providers to fill the vacant channels on a provisional 
basis until the normal paperwork is completed.  He implied 
that Fubon, were it to receive a license to open a news 
station, would have to apply to the cable companies for its 
assigned channel on each cable network. 
 
================================= 
Review Process Lacks Transparency 
================================= 
 
10.  (C) Much of the criticism directed at GIO is centered on 
the non-transparent nature of the review committee 
proceedings.  Although a public body appointed by the 
Director General of the GIO, the names of the License Review 
Committee members were not made public until a local 
newspaper (the Apple Daily) published their names.  The 
opposition Kuomintang (KMT) also released the names of the 
Committee members, finally forcing the GIO to reluctantly 
confirm the names after several days.  The deliberations of 
the Committee are not public and the GIO did not hold any 
public hearing to discuss the criteria used in their review 
process.  GIO offered that its reluctance to release the 
names stemmed from concern over Committee member privacy and 
that GIO Director General Yao was currently considering 
whether to release certain parts of the Committee's 
deliberations to the public. 
 
============================================= 
GIO: "Public Supports Us, Anyway, Who Cares?" 
============================================= 
 
11.  (C) When asked about GIO's response to the criticism of 
its decision to refuse to renew the licenses for these seven 
broadcasters, Tseng noted ironically that before the decision 
was announced, the most common complaint about GIO was that 
it was failing to rein in the unruly Taiwan media.  But after 
the decision, GIO was accused of reverting to despotism and 
trampling on human rights.  Tseng pointed to a China Times 
sponsored poll that he claimed showed that despite the outcry 
in the media, 40% of the Taiwan public agreed with the GIO 
action, with only 20% opposed. 
 
12.  (C) Tseng did not see the need for GIO to make 
significant changes to its review process, noting that it 
mattered little since GIO was due to be abolished to make way 
for the National Communications Commission (NCC).  He added 
that the NCC Preparatory Committee is in the process of 
drafting amendments to the Broadcast Law that could be 
submitted in the Fall legislative session.  By the next 
large-scale review of broadcast licenses there will be a new 
law and a new body in place to enforce it, said Tseng. 
 
13. (C) COMMENT: No one will dispute that the quality of 
Taiwan television programming, and especially television 
news, is exceptionally poor.  Video is faked, dramatizations 
are passed off as live reports, and every news channel buys 
the same film footage to breathlessly report the same human 
interest and celebrity-driven stories.  GIO clearly has 
statutory responsibility for enforcing regulations designed 
to protect the public welfare, including determining whether 
to renew licenses.  The broadcasters affected are among the 
worst of Taiwan's television media.  However, the complete 
lack of transparency and the apparently arbitrary nature of 
the decision to refuse license renewal to some low-quality 
stations while allowing other low-quality stations to 
continue operating recalls the excesses of the 
pre-liberalization GIO that tightly controlled Taiwan media 
to ensure dissenting voices were muffled.  Some commentators 
have suggested this is a case of GIO "killing the chicken to 
scare the monkey," i.e., closing down some less important 
stations in order to encourage more responsible behavior from 
the rest.  If so, GIO has unleashed a torrent of criticism 
that may undermine its purpose. 
 
14.  (C) More likely, GIO sees the closure of these stations 
as the fulfillment of its "duty" to control the media.  Many 
of the GIO senior staff are allegedly strong KMT supporters 
and veterans of the martial law era when the GIO was charged 
with maintaining tight control over the media to protect the 
"public welfare."  Conventional wisdom suggests that ethos 
remains part of the GIO organizational culture, despite Green 
political leadership at the top.  Perhaps most distressing is 
what appears to be a lack of concern about public 
accountability among senior GIO staff.  Tseng's comment that 
the next review will be someone else's problem after the GIO 
is abolished and its duties incorporated into the NCC 
suggests that GIO's senior leadership feels marginalized and 
cut off from responsibility for its policy decisions.  Such 
an environment discourages needed improvements in public 
consultation and transparency.  As a result, GIO's 
credibility will continue to erode and its ability to slow 
the further deterioration of Taiwan's media will suffer.  END 
COMMENT. 
PAAL