{"id":625,"date":"2026-08-27T16:51:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-27T14:51:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mediaforum.hu\/?p=625"},"modified":"2026-08-31T17:48:07","modified_gmt":"2026-08-31T15:48:07","slug":"a-mediaforum-egyesulet-allaspontja-a-mediarendszer-atalakitasaban-valo-szakmai-reszvetelrol","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mediaforum.hu\/en\/2026\/08\/27\/a-mediaforum-egyesulet-allaspontja-a-mediarendszer-atalakitasaban-valo-szakmai-reszvetelrol\/","title":{"rendered":"Professional Participation in the Reform of the Public Media System"},"content":{"rendered":"

The public media governance process is problematic, but easily rectified. It is vital, however, that Hungary\u2019s new media policy makes the sustainability of independent media a priority.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Under the amended Media Act, the governance of public service media in Hungary will soon be overhauled: ownership rights will be exercised by the newly established Independent Public Media Board (FKT). Of the FKT\u2019s nine members, three will be nominated by the governing party and three by opposition parliamentary groups. Three further members will be selected from candidates nominated by professional and civil society organizations active in the media. M\u00e9diaf\u00f3rum Association\u2014a professional organization for independent media\u2014participated in the process and submitted a nominee.<\/p>\n

As prescribed by the law, the professional nominations were officiated by the Public Service Council (KT), an already existing oversight body. The KT was tasked with organizing hearings for the nominees and subsequently submitting three candidates to the relevant committee of parliament. M\u00e9diaf\u00f3rum considers several aspects of the nomination process problematic for the reasons detailed below. In our view, there were no safeguards in place to ensure that credible representatives of the media profession and media industry were presented to decision-makers.<\/p>\n

On August 24, 2026, our association, together with seven other media organizations, addressed a letter<\/a> to the parliamentary Committee on Culture. At the committee\u2019s meeting the following day, the hearings for the nominees were canceled.<\/p>\n

Why is this issue important?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Under Viktor Orb\u00e1n\u2019s rule (2010\u20132026), his Fidesz party and affiliated media outlets have used extreme measures to attack journalists, editors, and publishers of the independent press. (One of the fundamental reasons of M\u00e9diaf\u00f3rum Association\u2019s founding was precisely to advocate for those targeted.) Fidesz-controlled public media has acted in accordance with political directives, defying professional standards and media ethics, depicting independent newsrooms as enemies of Hungary.<\/p>\n

That the newly elected parliament amended the Media Act so that nominees of the media profession, too, hold seats on the body exercising ownership rights over the renewed public media therefore carries symbolic weight<\/strong>. It signals that the governing majority intends public media to operate as part of the system of democratic public discourse<\/strong>, and not as an instrument of power serving a party or an individual. (Future members of the FKT\u2014whether nominated by the parties or by the professional organizations\u2014will themselves be independent: they will not represent whoever nominated them, they cannot be instructed, and they cannot be recalled.)<\/p>\n

A better model for the oversight of public media will in all likelihood be found when the Media Act is comprehensively revised at a later stage. The three media-professional seats on the FKT are one possible institutional answer, but the involvement of the profession could equally be secured by complementary or alternative arrangements: a standing consultative forum, mandatory public consultation, a mandatory prior assessment of effects on the media market, or an advisory body. The overall vision for the reform\u2014on which our association will likewise put forward its proposals\u2014is not yet worked out. It is understandable, therefore, that the attention of the professional organizations is focused on the legitimacy of the one nomination procedure that does exist, and in which they were able to take part now.<\/p>\n

The democratic public sphere<\/strong><\/p>\n

The reform of public media is not an end in itself. The goal is the fullest possible democratic public sphere: a system in which citizens can inform themselves from credible, verified and diverse sources, and in which those exercising power can be held to account. Public media is one element among many in this system\u2014alongside national and local newsrooms, non-profit outlets, investigative teams, and industry, educational and research organizations. And this system already has elements that work very well today:<\/strong> the independent media ecosystem<\/strong> built over the past sixteen years under extremely difficult circumstances, sustained by subscriptions and donations by members of the Hungarian public.<\/p>\n

It follows that the rebuilding of public media must be carried out with the entire media system in mind<\/strong>. The FKT will not be deciding on a simple institutional matter: the law assigns seventeen tasks to it, from electing the chief executive officers through appointing the auditors to the prior approval of high-value contracts. These decisions shape the operating conditions of the entire media market: the labour market, the advertising environment, and the relationship between public media and independent newsrooms. The composition of the Board is therefore not an internal affair of public media, but a matter for the whole of Hungarian public life.<\/p>\n

Experiences of the nomination PROCESS<\/strong><\/p>\n

We stress that the objections set out in the letter of the media organizations do not concern the person or the integrity of the candidates preferred by the KT, just the procedure itself. The problems highlighted by the professional organizations are these:<\/p>\n