Sri Lanka election head withdraws TV censorship after criticism

Sri Lanka's election commission chief on Sunday backed down from plans to censor a state-owned TV station following criticism that his actions were supporting the main opposition candidate at this month's presidential polls.

In a surprise move, commission chairman Mahinda Deshapriya had banned any political programming on the Independent Television Network (ITN) after accusing the channel of harming the campaign of frontrunner Gotabhaya Rajapakse.

"After considering many representations by several parties that my order was discriminatory, I revoke the (censorship) order issued on ITN," Deshapriya said in a letter to the broadcaster, seen by AFP.

The censorship order, which had been due to come into effect midnight Sunday, came after ITN aired a programme alleging loyalists to the previous regime thwarted a corruption probe into strongman ex-president Mahinda Rajapakse's family.

Independent poll-monitoring group the People's Action for Free and Fair Elections (PAFFREL) said privately-owned TV stations were worse than ITN in violating campaign laws and in supporting one candidate over others.

"We have always maintained that it is discriminatory to target only state-run media because the bigger offenders are the private channels," PAFFREL chief Rohana Hettiarachchi told AFP.

He said his organisation was instead calling for the strict implementation of campaign rules on all media outlets.

"They are all using frequencies which belong to all people of this country," he said.

"Therefore all have a responsibility to provide balanced coverage without breaking campaign laws."
"The correct thing would have been to impose heavy fines for violations... whether by private or state media."