Gag Law in Mexico. Background: In November 2016, the Federal Telecommunications Institute published the agreement that approved and issued the defense of hearings’ general guidelines.
All of this implied that they would practically handle the editorial line and content of the newscasts.
In April 2017, the Chamber of Deputies approved the opinion that modified, added, and deleted various provisions of the Federal Telecommunications and Broadcasting Law on the hearings’ rights, it annulled what was approved in 2014 and, consequently, the guidelines of the Federal Telecommunications Institute.
In December 2017, the representatives of the Mexican Association of the Public Defenders Office (AMDA) filed a legal protection lawsuit against the changes the Union Congress made to the Federal Law on Telecommunications and Broadcasting.
In 2020, Jonathan Bass Herrera, Mexico City’s First District Administrative Matters Judge, granted protection to the association previously mentioned; months later, this appeal was reviewed by a collegiate court and later reached the Second Chamber of the Nation Supreme Court of Justice. The same ratified the district judge’s decision and maintained the granting of protection to both, the association and a group of people against the Federal Telecommunications and Broadcasting Law provisions.
The Federal Telecommunications Institute H2
The Federal Telecommunications Institute is in charge of monitoring and sanctioning the activity of companies in the sector, such as the transmission of advertising and propaganda, disguised as journalistic information. Additionally, it is obliged to the following:
If there is a mention of a product or a service, even in the middle of information, it must be introduced as advertising or sponsorship. If it is considered to be a commercial mention, the media can be sanctioned.
It is established within our human rights that the freedom to disseminate opinions, information, and ideas, through any means, is untouchable.
This right cannot be restricted by indirect means. No law or authority can establish prior censorship, or restrict the freedom of broadcasting, this law, known by many as "Gag Law", is unconstitutional and causes great harm to all who disseminate information, regardless of whether it is a journalist or only one person expressing his or her opinion.
Expression freedom and the right to information are constitutional guarantees written in articles six and seven of the Magna Carta. With the "Gag Law", expression freedom and the right to information would remain in the hands of the commissioners of the Federal Telecommunications Institute, violating México’s international treaties.
These reforms are unconstitutional since the expression of ideas cannot be the subject of any judicial or administrative inquisition, unless they go against established morals, private life, third parties rights, be the cause of a crime, or disturb public order.
All people have the free right to share information and all types of ideas by any means.
There are not similar norms or a similar regime of censorship in a democratic country. With this resolution, any judge can take this antecedent and then order the legislature to restore the annulled law.
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