Independent Polish media suspend coverage to protest ad tax

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Independent media outlets in Poland suspended news coverage and other programming Wednesday to protest a planned new advertising tax that they view as an attempt by the country’s rightwing government to undermine press freedoms.

The Government says the “solidarity” tax would raise money to bolster State finances badly strained by the coronavirus pandemic. But 45 media companies signed a letter that said they already pay many taxes and that the advertising tax could push some to collapse.

“We strongly oppose the use of the epidemic as an excuse to introduce another new, exceptionally heavy burden on the media,” they wrote as websites and TV screens in Poland went dark for 24 hours.

Gazeta Wyborcza, the country’s leading newspaper and a liberal critic of the populist Government, called the advertising tax “a powerful blow to free media”. In place of the usual news items on its webpage was a black screen and a warning that if the tax is passed, the publication’s readers could one day lose access to independent news.

Broadcaster TVN, which is owned by the US company Discovery Inc, also joined the protest. Viewers who turned to all-news station TVN24 and other channels only saw a black screen and the words “Your favourite programming was supposed to be here”.

The United States and the European Union stressed their support for media diversity on Wednesday.

The chargé d’affaires at the US Embassy in Warsaw, Bix Aliu, called free media “a cornerstone of democracy”, and said “the United States will always defend media independence”.

In Brussels, a spokesman for the EU’S executive arm acknowledged the media

protest, saying “We have seen the black screens.” Poland belongs to the 27-nation bloc.

“We expect member states to ensure that their fiscal or other policies will not affect the duty of ensuring a free, independent and diverse media ecosystem,” European Commission spokesman Christian Wigand said. “This is, of course, all the more important in times of the pandemic, which has hit the media sector hard.”

Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki cast the planned tax an effort to level out the playing field between small and big companies and to force technology giants like Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon to contribute their fair share.