The National Communications Commission (NCC) will submit draft legislation regulating cross-media ownership by the end of the next legislative session, NCC Chairperson Howard Shyr (石世豪) said yesterday, adding that the regulations would be included in the planned digital convergence act (數位匯流法).
Shyr made the comments at the legislature’s Transportation Committee, where he had been expected to brief lawmakers on the Democratic Progressive Party’s proposed amendments to the Radio and Television Act (廣播電視法), the Cable Television Act (有線電視法) and the Satellite Broadcasting Act (衛星廣播電視法) to prevent media monopolization.
However, Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers boycotted the meeting. They said it was decided in Friday’s meetings that the amendments would first be reviewed by the Transportation Committee. Under the legislature’s rules, each lawmaker can propose reconsideration of legislation within 10 days of it undergoing official review at the committee.
KMT legislators Wu Yu-sheng (吳育昇) and Luo Shu-lei (羅淑蕾) said that period was not over.
They said the DPP meant to use the briefing to force the committee to review its amendments, leaving the KMT with nothing more to add to the amendments.
However, DPP Legislator Tsai Chi-chang (蔡其昌) said yesterday’s meeting was a “briefing,” during which the commission would give its opinion on the amendments, not an official review.
DPP caucus whip Ker Chien-ming (柯建銘) said the Martial Law era was long over and his party wanted to hear what the commission had to say about the legislation, adding that the topic of the briefing should not be dictated by the KMT.
DPP Legislator Wei Ming-ku (魏明谷), who presided the meeting, ruled to recess, during which the two parties negotiated in a bid to stop the gridlock.
The lawmakers eventually reached an agreement to schedule another meeting on Wednesday.
Based on the amendments proposed by DPP, cable service operators must recruit people from outside their corporations to serve on their boards, shares held directly or indirectly by overseas investors must not exceed 60 percent and bank loans must not exceed 30 percent of the company’s capital.
The DPP amendments would also restrict investments from financial holdings firms, banks and insurance firms in broadcast media.
The commission said it was more appropriate to stipulate such a restriction in the Financial Holding Company Act (金融控股公司法), the Banking Act (銀行法) and the Insurance Act (保險法).
The commission also said that it would restrict the number of TV channels owned by cable TV operators to less than 10 percent of the number of basic channels.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
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Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching