Prague, Oct 11 (CTK) – The public Czech Television (CT) has filed a legal complaint against the Bloc against Islamisation movement over its election spot featuring “false Muslims,” daily Lidove noviny (LN) wrote on Wednesday.
CT has also proposed that the Council for Radio and Television Broadcasting deal with the affair, the paper adds.
The video shows a group of people dressed like Muslims running towards an elderly woman with a walker and knocking her down. She lies on the floor, while the people covered with scarves are running to a sign reading “Welfare benefit counter.”
CT was obliged to broadcast the spots of all parties and movements running in the October 20-21 general election.
The Bloc against Islamisation, whose most distinctive member is former Social Democrat (CSSD) MP Jana Volfova, says in a comment in the spot: “You will be able to choose on October 20 and 21 whether to give money to our children and elderly or to Muslims and Africans.”
The movement claims that its video “tries to highlight the fact that the state only has one pile of money at its disposal.” It is up to the voters whether they will support “illegal immigrants, often Islamists, or our own seniors,” it adds.
CT did not consider the video material sent by the Bloc against Islamisation suitable for public broadcasting and this is why it called on the movement to provide another spot, which it did not do, the daily writes.
The problematic spot was broadcast on CT against its will, along with the spots of other parities running in the general election.
“In the case of the election spot of the Bloc against Islamisation, Czech TV asked for providing another programme, within its legal possibilities, and filed a legal complaint,” CT spokeswoman Karolina Blinkova said.
The running entities are responsible for the content of their spots broadcast free on Czech Television in the selected times, she added.
CT also warned the Council for Radio and Television Broadcasting that law may have been violated in this case.