Lithuanian parties to be gagged during elections?

VILNIUS-- Lithuanian parliamentarians have agreed agreed that video and audioclips on radio and television will be banned during the official campaigningperiod for October's parliamentary elections, while political advertisementswill be regulated by the Central Electoral Committee.

According to amendments to the Law on Financing of Political Parties andPolitical Campaigns and Financing Control adopted on Tuesday, advertisement ofall political parties and their candidates will be organized on a proportionalbasis so that parties with most votes at the last elections will receive moreair time.

Part of the reasoning is that the measure will prevent well-funded butsmall-scale niche parties from buying up airtime, though it also runs the riskof perpetuating a political status quo.

Petras Austrevicius of the Liberal Movement expressed indignation over thenew procedures that the amount of advertisement would depend on the results oflast elections and the number of proposed candidates.

"Colleagues, let me say that such principles threaten to be discriminatoryand without equal rights, particularly to the newer parties," saidAustrevicius.

A member of the Order and Justice Party, Valentinas Mazuronis, dismissed theamendments as "democracy's funeral" and expressed a lack ofconfidence in the central electoral authority, accusing it of acting to supportthe ruling parties.

Advertisements of political parties should be financed from the statebudget. Calculations suggest that 2 million litas (EUR 0.6 mln) would be neededfor this year's parliamentary elections, with money allocated by the CentralElectoral Committee that received a total of approximately 27 million litasfrom the state budget this year.

Earlier this year, the government suggested granting the 2 million litasfrom the budget grant for parties (20 million litas for 2008), however, groupsof political parties opposed the proposal.

If signed into law by the president, the ban on ads ofpolitical parties will be in effect throughout the election campaign (a monthprior to the Oct. 12 elections).