VTV told the private news channel that payment would start next Sunday ... Globovision rejected the demand as unconstitutional and exorbitant

Caracas Daily Journal (Jeremy Morgan): Globovision, the privately-owned all-news television station, claimed that state channel VTV had abruptly demanded payment for re-broadcasting its material at a rates equivalent to Bs.F.432,000 an hour from next Sunday.

VTV hadn't announced the move. Instead, it emerged when Globovisión issued a lengthy statement expressing its opposition to VTV President Yuri Pimentel's demand, and insisting it wouldn't pay.

The rate was set a Bs.F.120 a second, meaning a minute of material would cost Bs.F.7,200. The only exception, according to Globovision, would be speeches by President Hugo Chavez or similar events in news items or "informative spaces."

Whether only Globovision was in VTV's sights or if the measure applied to regional and community channels or satellite stations remained unclear.

Up to now, the common practice has been for stations to lift material from each other without payment, but carrying a credit. While it was also unclear when VTV made its demand, the short notice until payment goes into effect probably added to the temper of Globovision's reaction. It condemned the move as "unconstitutional" and an attempt "against the Venezuelans' freedom of expression and information."

The charges envisaged by VTV -- "the channel of all the Venezuelans," as Globovision put it -- were "exorbitant" and sought to put "the wish for wealth above the interests" of the population, the statement continued. The rate will apply to both live transmissions taken from VTV, or material used after the event.

Globovision said it was being expected to pay for statements by ministers, governors, legislators, mayors and other public officials, political leaders or citizens about matters of public interest, but to which it was not allowed access. It had become notorious and common knowledge to Venezuelans and the international community that the state had set a policy of impeding and limiting official access to Globovision and its journalists, the statement said.

Globovision claimed that most of the time, it wasn't invited to official press conferences, or allowed access to government offices or information. For this reason, VTV was the sole source of some information.

The Venezuelan state, Globovision said, had put an "irrational and excessive price on the broadcast of information of general interest" -- and it had done so when the Inter-American Human Rights Court was hearing a case brought against the Venezuelan state for violating the rights of freedom of speech of Globovision workers.
Globovision raised the point that, in making its move, it might be shooting itself and the government in the foot. While other countries' governments wanted their statements to reach the widest possible audience, this one was limiting distribution of its own information.