Regulations governing radio stations will be gazetted under the Sri Lanka Broadcasting Corporation Act within the next two weeks following the new regulations gazetted to monitor private television broadcasting stations in the country.
Media Minister Lakshman Yapa Abeywardena said the regulations pertaining to radio stations had been submitted to the Attorney General’s Department for scrutiny and would be gazetted thereafter.
He said the new regulations which were likely to be gazetted next week would apply to all radio stations including state controlled ones.
The minister said the regulations had to be submitted to Court as part of its submissions in connection with the case filed by Minister Janaka Bandara Tennekoon challenging the issue of a licence to the LTTE to operate a radio station during the UNP regime of 2001-2004.
“All this time what we have been doing is issuing temporary licences to operate radio and TV stations. The Court questioned as to why there were no regulations pertaining to the operations of radio stations. Hence we prepared these regulations and will submit them to court,” he said.
Asked why the new regulations pertaining to the operation of television stations was brought in hurriedly, the minister said that TV broadcasting stations too had been unregulated so far and so the new rules were introduced to avoid similar legal problems.He said the regulations had been prepared by an advisory committee and were not rushed in to control the private media as claimed by critics.
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