The Budapest Municipal Court on Friday upheld the decision of Hungary’s top media authority to strip commercial Klubrádió from the use of the 92.9 MHz frequency.
Klubrádió challenged the National Media and Communications Authority’s (NMHH) decision in court in March, when the body closed a tender for the frequency without declaring a winner. The authority’s Media Council rejected Klubrádió’s offer for failing to comply with several requirements even though it was the sole bidder. The station popular with opposition listeners said in a statement that it considered the Media Council’s “excuses” against its bid “unlawful”.
NMHH said in a statement that the non-binding ruling had fully rejected the station’s claims, saying the NMHH’s acts had been entirely lawful when it rejected the bid. The court said the bid contained “flaws warranting disqualification”, and the station’s economic operation ran afoul of legal requirements and the conditions of the tender. In the verbal reasoning of the ruling, the court said Klubrádió’s programme plan was “incomplete and inconsistent”, and could not be considered at the tender. Therefore, the authority was right in concluding that Klubrádió would not be able to comply with the tender’s goals, since its operation was unlawful and could not prove it had taken actions to rectify the situation, the court said.
hungarymatters.hu
