Basque TV eyes expansion in other provinces

Iñaki Ferreras ©RapidTVNews | 31-08-2010

Basque public broadcaster EiTB wants to buy two of neighbouring region Navarra's regional channels, Canal 4 and Canal 6, in order to be able to broadcast legally in the province.

The northern Spanish region of the Basque Country has always looked for expansion and its natural expanding territory is Navarra, one of Spain's richest territories. The government of the Basque Country has always thought of Navarra as another part of its territory. One of the best ways to establish this idea is television.

Both regional channels in Navarra have got DTT licenses. If EiTB’s operation goes forward, the Basque broadcaster would not have to pay nearly €1 million a year to Navarra's regional government in order to be able to deploy its programming in the territory by buying a complete DTT mux.

The proposed operation has political implications between both the Basque and the Navarra autonomous region governments. A year ago the governments sealed an agreement in order to collaborate on exchanging TV signals. But the conflict of how the Navarran people can get Basque public TV remains unresolved.

Another problem is both Navarran channels are financed with public money so it would have to be the Navarran goverment which decided what to do with them. That creates a political dilemma for the government.

 

EiTB-Spain DTT

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