On Tuesday we brought you a portion of the consultation for the proposed new Broadcasting Act. It seeks to enforce government oversight and licensing requirements even for online broadcasters, streaming services, and social media content.
Today we spoke to one attorney who also doubles as an owner of a news and entertainment Facebook page and he explained that the law is draconian. Orson Elrington told us if the bill is passed, he will apply for a constitutional challenge. Here's what he said:
Orson "OJ" Elrington, Attorney
"The piece of legislation is what I believe to be the most archaic and asinine piece of legislation I have seen any government try to implement. It is draconian, it makes absolutely no sense and it makes an attempt to chill and to murder any attempt by citizens to voice their opinions on the internet. The Belize Broadcasting Authority and why broadcasters historically needed to get licenses is because as you would know, radio and TV, there were limited bandwidths, so it was created to be able to allocate these bandwidths and say well Channel 7 can have one, Channel 5 can have one but they are limited so we have to be able to ensure there are varying opinions and it is not dominated by anybody and if you have these bandwidths you comply with these conditions. Now what the government is seeking to do is to implement a piece of legislation that no other country has done, no other country has taken these draconian and drastic measure to silence the opinions of the people."
"We see there are all of these different leaks about corruption being rampant in the different ministries, rather than implementing legislation to address that type of corruption, they are instead attempting to put in legislation that would effectively be able to fine people $50,000 for a simple Facebook post, for somebody going live. If that is not crazy, if that is not asinine, if that is not ridiculous, if that is not grounds for every single person who thinks it is important for us to have the freedom of expression to say no, that cannot and will not and can never be accepted then I don't know what can be."
