A New Law, An Old Complaint

From Luxembourg, Monaco, Andorra and the Saar, powerful radio transmitters beam across the border into France. Their presence infuriates the French government, which, except for those uncontrollable transmitters, hogs the country's air. But Frenchmen by the grateful millions tune in to the foreign wave lengths. It is the only way that they can listen to something their own government-owned network almost never sends: an undoctored dose of news.

Half a Minute. Newcasts over Radiodiffusion Television Franc,aise, the government monopoly, have long been regarded with Gallic cynicism. "We are given slanted, incomplete or false news," said a Deputy in the National Assembly. Under De Gaulle, as under all his predecessors, RTF is employed as a highly useful instrument of state. Its TV eye is fixed hypnotically on the movements of the President, and its transmitters endlessly broadcast his public utterances. Any De Gaulle press conference is generally put on the air at least twice.

Nor does Director-General Robert Bordaz, a government appointee, have to be reminded what kind of newscasts the general prefers. Since France granted recognition to Communist China last winter, RTF's larger TV chain has carried documentaries on France's new Oriental friend that might have been produced by Mao Tse-tung himself. They showed Red China in such a flattering light that televiewers sent bitter letters to the press.

Against such competition, President De Gaulle's opponents and critics find it next to impossible to get a hearing. Last January RTF gave just half a minute of TV coverage to the speech in which Socialist Gaston Defferre announced his political designs on De Gaulle's office. The camera, sweeping swiftly through the crowd, somehow managed to miss the speaker's face.

Only Promise. Moved by a swelling tide of protest against RTF's disciplined news, Minister of Information Alain Peyrefitte recently presented the National Assembly with a statute that he claimed would relax government control of the network. At first glance, the new law, which would change RTF's name to L'Office de Radiodiffusion Television Franc,aise, or ORTF, looked promising. It would, for instance, permit camera crews to chase big stories without first securing the signatures of seven government functionaries. But the promise was only that. Reaffirmed was the government's old right to keep all competitive transmitters out of France, and to appoint the network's director-general. "You are changing the label," said Assembly Deputy Maurice Faure, "but not the bottle."

Last week the new ORTF statute became law. But even before that happened, Director-General Dordaz had gone to Moscow to be the guest of Mikhail Kharlamov, chairman of the Soviet State Committee on Broadcasting and Television.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.