CtiTV News license renewal case
CtiTV, also known as Chung T’ien Television, belongs to Want Want China Times Groups, which also owns China Television (CTV) in Taiwan. Recently the license of this news channel is about to expire at the end of this year and has generated a heated debate within the country. CtiTV has been known for advocating for a pro-Beijing perspective and its parent company, Want Want China Times, has also been criticized for its pro-PRC movements and monopoly in media in Taiwan (Want Want Group owns several media outlets such as CtiTV, CTV, and the China Times newspaper.)
Its founder, Tsai Eng-Meng, who was born and raised in Taiwan, due to his strong business market in China, has been holding a strong belief against Taiwan’s independence. He deliberately told the public that the fact he purchased these media outlets is to promote positive views of the People’s Republic of China in Taiwan. This has hence fueled people who long hold pro-independent beliefs and the younger generation who are actively seeking Taiwan independence. Because of his monopoly in media in Taiwan, it caused the anti-media monopoly movement in 2012 which called for NCC (The National Communications Commission) to prevent media monopoly and partially caused the Sunflower Student Movement in 2014. A lot of key leaders in the 2014 movement originally started their activities in 2012 and some of them now have become leaders in DDP (Democratic Progressive Party) and some of them also became legislators.
CtiTV has long been criticized for its tight relationship with the government of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and its biased, pro-China, and off-topic news. Financial Times reported that CtiTV, CTV, and their parent company, Want Want Group, were directly seeking approval from China’s Taiwan Office (TAO) before airing news or publishing stories. Also, in April 2019, Apple Daily disclosed that Want Want Group received over 477 million Chinese Yuan (around USD 71 million) from the government of the People’s Republic of China between 2017 and 2018. During last year’s presidential election in Taiwan, CtiTV gave 70% of its May airtime to KMT (Kuomintang, the party that founded the Republic of China in 1912) presidential candidate Han Kuo-Yu. The channel also inflated the crowd count at Han’s mayoral inauguration. The news channel had been reporting Han’s personal life and unrelated, exaggerating news. For example, CtiTV once reported auspicious cloud shaped like a phoenix had appeared above an event that Han attended along with fellow KMT mayors. CtiTV was fined NTD$ 200,000 and 400,000 (USD$ 7,000 and 13,000) respectively for these news coverages.
Because of its controversy, NCC has set up hearings to learn more from both sides. The public in Taiwan is paying close attention to the hearings. We are still not sure if the license renewal will be rejected by NCC or not, but a lot of people who support the government (or NCC) to decline its renewal have pointed out valid reasons for NCC to reject it. One, over the past six years, CtiTV has violated the rules 23 times, has been warned twice, and was fined 21 times with the total amount of NTD$ 10 million (USD$ 375,000.) Outside of political issues, CtiTV has been generating fake news, violence, content that is not suitable for children, or pornographic advertisement. The second reason is that except ignoring the ethical values in journalism, they still haven’t obeyed the attached items for their license renewal request in 2014. The attached items include 1. Regularly hold internal staff training, 2. Set up an ethical committee that covers gender equality, women’s rights, children protection, freedom of the press, consumer protection, and should hire professionals and experts to join the committee, 3. Hire full-time dedicated editors, 4. Set up an independent censorship system.
Whereas the people who support CtiTV argued that by revoking its license, it also means the government is taking away the people’s freedom of speech. They indicated that by doing so, the Taiwanese government has no difference in dictatorship and it’s the same as the PRC government. They believe that there’s definitely has something to do with political issues and they believe the Tsai Ing-Wen’s government will interfere with this decision too. Some people who slightly disagree think that even though the news channel has been collaborating with the Chinese government’s propaganda, as a country that prides in democracy and freedom, we should not use any political power to stop any voice that is different from the government. They think even though the majority of the Taiwanese people (63%) tend to declare independence and distrust the PRC government, it still doesn’t make it reasonable for the government to interfere with this issue.
The hearing was held on October 26th and a lot of experts were invited to join the hearing. On top of inviting the experts, the founder of Want Want Group, Tsai Eng-Meng, also participated in the hearing. During the hearing, Tsai Eng-Meng was accused of intervening in editorial decisions on how to report the hearing and license renewal. Despite the strong denial by Tsai Eng-Meng, the former legislative Huang Kuo-Chang provided several screenshots from a WeChat group. In the screenshots, we could clearly see that the business tycoon Tsai Eng-Meng was giving instructions to the managers and editorials on what to focus on in both print and broadcast media. To sum up the hearing, a lot of scholars doubt that CtiTV would be able to conduct self-reviews through their mechanism.
According to the survey on Watchout, 53% of the public would like to keep the CtiTV and only 33% support the denial of their license renewal. However, the survey was released before the release of those screenshots, the survey result might differ again. From my own observation on social media, a lot of people agree with rejecting CtiTV’s license renewal but also question the government’s power. They think it’s better to close down this notorious channel and give Taiwan a more peaceful time without PRC’s intervention. However, they are afraid that the government is only doing so just to keep the people who disagree with the government’s mouths shut. In the comments on social media, it’s not hard to see other people supporting CtiTV claiming that Taiwan deserves more voices outside of ‘Green voice’ (indicating DPP’s voice).
In my opinion, I also agree with rejecting CtiTV’s license renewal but I’m not sure if this would be the ultimate solution. Like I mentioned above, Want Want Group controls not just one media outlet so they can easily switch to promote PRC’s propaganda on other platforms. I also agree with some people’s concern that the government is doing so just to avoid different opinions from different groups. To circle back to CtiTV’s relation with PRC, I truly think it’d only harm Taiwan’s harmony and increase more divergence. From what I can recall, during the presidential election, some of my relatives were watching CtiTV and they were influenced unconsciously that Taiwan would be better if we unified with the People’s Republic of China. Also, in their news coverage, I’ve seen a lot of ridiculous content such as the candidate wearing a black cap looked like Tom Cruise, the hotpot place he visited, and some other fake and nonsense news. I believe in a democratic country, we should accept and respect different voices (agree to disagree) as these diverse opinions can help shape our future together. But I strongly think media outlet shouldn’t be one of the tools for propaganda (I guess it’s hard…) To solve this issue, I think NCC would need to provide more evidence and strong reasons to prove that rejecting CtiTV’s license renewal is for the public good, rather than benefiting the government.
Case update:
NCC (The National Communications Commission) decided not to renew CtiTV’s news license. They unanimously rejected(with the vote of 7:0) the license renewal. For more details, please check the news here.
References:
- KMT Likely to Make CtiTV’s Operations License Renewal into A Contested Issue, New Bloom, October 24th, 2020.
- CtiTV gave 70% of May airtime to Han Kuo-yu, Taipei Times, July 18th, 2019.
- Tycoon lied in CTiTV license renewal case: ex-lawmaker, Focus Taiwan CAN English News, October 30th, 2020.
- Financial Times Reports That Taiwanese Media Outlets Are Seeking Chinese Government Approval For Stories, New Bloom, July 18th, 2019.
- Date set for CtiTV News license hearing, Taipei Times, October 7th, 2020.
- Ma calls on US to ‘keep an eye on’ CtiTV hearing, Taipei Times, October 18th, 2020.
- NCC to invite experts to CtiTV News hearing, Taipei Times, October 8th, 2020.
- The Anti-Media Monopoly Movement, DayBreak, July 25th, 2017.
- Survey on Watchout, October 27th, 2020.
- Chung T’ien Television, Wikipedia
- Tsai Eng-meng, Wikipedia
- Differences between Republic of China (Taiwan) and People’s Republic of China, Evelyne Kuo on Medium, 2019
