GEA participates in the press conference of the Iniciativa polo galego no audiovisual on the report for the implementation of the Audiovisual Directive in the European Parliament

Santiago de Compostela, 10 May 2023. – Representatives of the audiovisual sector evaluated this morning at a press conference the approval, by the European Parliament, of the report for the application of the Audiovisual Directive, highlighting the inclusion of an amendment drafted by the entities grouped in the Initiative for the Galician audiovisual sector, which were represented by representatives: Margarita Ledo Andión e Mª Soliña Barreiro do Grupo de Estudos Audiovisuais da USC, Marcos Maceira de A Mesa pola Normalización Lingüística, Andrés Bellas de APRADOGA, Uxía Caride da AGAPI e Iria Taibo da AGPTI. By videoconference, the MEPs François Alfonsi (co-president of the EP languages intergroup) and Ana Miranda (member of the BNG) intervened.

Margarita Ledo Andión gave way to the different interventions in the round. Mª Soliña Barreiro recalled that the USC Audiovisual Studies Group has been working for more than ten years on three research projects related to this issue, such as Cine, diversidade e redes (2010-2012), eDCINEMA: Cara o Espazo Dixital Europeo (2013-2015) and EUVOS. Patrimonio Cultural Inmaterial. He also defended that the work developed by the group converges with other operators in order to improve the audiovisual law.

On the other hand, Uxía Caride, president of AGAPI, said that a step forward has been taken in joint work by the professional sector, but that we must continue to improve the framework for action through greater protection for our own films from independent producers as guarantors of linguistic freedom. He said that the internationalisation of our cinema is going through a good moment and that this is the beginning of the way.

The next speaker was Marcos Maceira, president of A Mesa pola Normalización Lingüística. He wished to congratulate Galician society and the groups for their work. He stressed that having access to audiovisual content in Galician is a right that facilitates linguistic diversity in Europe. As well as that the Spanish state fails to comply with the European directive on the percentage and levels of broadcasting in co-official languages.

From Strasbourg, the BNG MEP, Ana Miranda, stressed the common support of the EP’s intergroup on languages with the amendments passed to the European Parliament, in particular 16 and 17, which order the Initiative for the promotion of Galician in the audiovisual sector. This benefits the dissemination of works in all types of minority, minority or regional languages in Europe and the representation of the cultural diversity of European territories.

Afterwards, François Alfonsi, co-president of the EP languages intergroup, congratulated the working group for the inclusion of historical languages and for the importance of the Galician language in this case. Andrés Bellas, from APRADOGA, reminded the audience that next month was the 40th anniversary of the law of linguistic normalization of Galicia and that this victory is a door that opens to fight for what we are interested in.

Margarita Ledo said goodbye to the speaker, affirming that the basic rights that the report itself urges to be put into practice in Spain, as well as supporting the agreements with the academic and professional audiovisual associations of the intangible heritage and citing the book published after the conferences organised by the GEA: “Perante a nova Lei do Audiovisual: análise e perspectivas”, coordinated by Mª Soliña Barreiro and with articles by: Margarita Ledo Andión and Antía López from the GEA, Ramón Zallo from the University of the Basque Country, Marcos Maceira from A Mesa pola Normalización Lingüística, Francesc Marco from Plataforma per la Llengua, Paul Bilbao from Euskalgintzaren Kontseilua, Uxía Caride from Agapi and Samuel Solleiro from the Asociación Galega de Profesionais da Tradución e da Interpretación.