KKE protests discrimination in the media

General Secretary of the Communist Party of Greece Aleka Papariga accused the mass media of an "ideological attack" on KKE, during a press conference on Wednesday following an announcement issued by the KKE Political Bureau of the CC of KKE on the media's post-electoral treatment of the KKE and the popular movement.

She also accused media owners of 'doctoring' the political developments, aimed at manipulating the developments and obstructing developments detrimental to the two mainstream parties, ruling New Democracy and main opposition PASOK.

She said the situation that has been created in the private and state media at the KKE's expense, particularly after the last general elections, was "blatantly provocative".

She said the real time allotted on news programmes for the KKE barely exceeded 2 percent, and accused the Radio-Television Coucil of being a 'simple observer' to this phenomenon, adding that it was the choice of the electronic and print media owners, noting that they use public frequencies, and charged that the declarations on polyphony and equality had proved to be hypocritical.

Another indication of the KKE's unequal treatment was that a large number of programmes on state channels did not invite representatives of the KKE, although they did invite people who had left the party decades ago and now belong to other parties to speak, even about the KKE's 90-year history.

Al. Papariga further charged that the majority of mass media ridiculed and slandered demonstrations and take-overs decided collectively by workers and the youth because they were counter to the choices of capital, while the only mobilisations they project are those that aid the two-party alternation in power.

She said all the mechanisms were being used to obstruct and cancel the growth of the popular movement, and to protect the two-party alternation, aimed at formulating bi-partisan solutions when the margins for single-party governments were depleted. The media interventions to influence the election of party leaders, as shown in the recent developments and leadership election in PASOK, and the ongoing developments in the Coalition of the Left (SYN), were in that direction.

"The KKE's electoral rise and the increase in its influence worries them," she said.

Al. Papariga termed the situation prevailing in the field of information as unacceptable, and criticised the government which, she said, has forgotten its older declarations against the collusion of business and publishing interests, adding that, with the new law, the concentration of media in the hands of capital was being strengthened.