Poland’s broadcasting regulator has said TVP failed in its public mission after the closure of some services and programmes led to a drop in advertising share.
On December 20, following the intervention of the minister of culture, the public broadcaster dropped regional programmes on TVP3, and closed the TVP Info and TVP World channels. News and current affairs programmes were also suspended.
The KRRiT says TVP was in breach of its Charter of Duty that runs between 2020 and 2024.
It added that TVP had failed to provide it with information about its services for the period between December 19, 2023 and January 26, 2024.
Under the charter, TVP must also provide audiences with access to its content over the internet, including TVP VOD, tvp.info, regions.tvp.pl and the TVP GO app. The TVP Info Internet portal disappeared on December 20, it was restored in mid-January, along with the station’s YouTube channel.
However, a number of programmes that were perceived to be favourable to the previous administration were removed, along with archive episodes of Teleexpress and Panorama.
Audiences to TVP Info have fallen dramatically, from 366,000 per minute between December 1 and 19 to 92,800 from the channel’s return on December 29 to January 28. The main evening news has lost around 338,000 viewers.
Advertising across the TVP channels has fallen by around 20 per cent year-on-year.
Following parliamentary elections in October 2023, the Law and Justice party lost office after eight years in power. A new government headed by former president of the European Council Donald Tusk took office in December 2023.
