KATHMANDU (April 11, 2008) — The Press Council Nepal (PCN) undertook a nationwide Media Monitoring Program (MMP) to assess the nature and characteristics of media coverage in the run up to the April-10 Constituent Assembly Election -- 2008, particularly in light of the Election Code of Conduct for the Mass Media brought into force by the Election Commission(EC). The thrust was to help the historic election process in which the nature of media coverage would be an important factor for EC to take into account in making its decisions.

The program started on March 9, 2008, the day when the Elections Code of Conduct came into effect. The 19-point EC code of conduct for both government and private media stipulated that all media should report on the election in a professional manner.

MMP found that the coverage across the board remained restrained. Most media outlets gave priority to CA election, candidates and their campaigns.

Isolated instances of violation found by the MMP were mostly related to clauses in the Code of Conduct related to "bias/prejudice/balance/inclusion/suppression" categories.

Mostly the weeklies, government media programs and some private FM and TV stationspracticed heavy doses of slanted opinion journalism. They generally tended to give a favorable coverage to a particular party or candidate at the expense of rival party or candidate.

The journalists and media shall perform:

(1) Protection and promotion of press freedom: Being freedom of opinion and expression a basic right of a citizen, to always remain firm, vigilant and alert for its protection and promotion.

(2) Recognition of human rights and international relations: To enhance protection and promotion of democracy, justice, equality peace and international collaboration and fraternity among friendly nations, while at the same time recognizing rights, interests, principles, norms and practices guaranteed by human rights related international instruments.

The principle objective of the Media Development Fund is to support the consolidation of democracy in Nepal by strengthening free and independent media. The immediate objective of the fund is to reduce the burden by subsidizing interest on loans granted to publishers of small newspapers. The fund will make it easier for small scale enterprises to procure loans.

Press Council Nepal has been preserving the Newspapers into CD/DVD since 1974. The collection dates till 2005. The council has about 2.5 million pages scanned and preserved in CDROM for further use.