New taxes bring out the worst in TV channels

TAX IMPOSITION: It needed the imposition of taxes for the truth to come out. Both private and State TV channels say they are terribly hurt by the new taxes on the telecasting of some foreign made films and teledramas.

While State TV channels make muffled complaints about high costs following the new taxes, the private channels are loud in their protests, preparing the launch of a media war against the Government on this issue.

Those in the business of television, who are very lavish in expenditure on promotions of their respective channels, are warning the Government and the public that they may soon be made insolvent by the new taxes on foreign films and teledramas, which are of little cultural value.

All these TV channels are private companies whose books are confidential and never open to public scrutiny. When they cry so loud about how the new taxes will hurt them, and also their viewers, honesty requires they show their actual levels of profit or loss, and prove to the public how the taxes will affect their business.

The truth that emerges from all the protests and public wringing of hands wilting under the burden of the new taxes is that the sole interest of these channels is profit, with little regard for the protection and enhancement of local culture. Profit is not bad, but it needs tempering with other interests too.

They have the least concern that the new taxes have been imposed, after much warning, in a bid to save the local cinema and teledrama industries, from the increasing threat of the foreign swill dished out with glee by these channels in a profit making exercise little regard for the morality of destroying traditional cultural values, and preventing development of local products of quality in culture and entertainment.

The beginnings

If one ignores the clapped up equipment that was brought here to set up the first TV station, named ITN, later acquired by the JRJ Government to take the burden off his nephew and converted it into a government channel, the real beginning of TV in Sri Lanka came with the launch of Rupavahini.

What is of note is that Rupavahini was gifted by Japan, but solely for purposes of education and culture, and not for pursuit of profit. While Rupavahini departed from that laudable expectation from its inception, the TV channels that followed also established themselves for the sole purpose of making profit, at whatever cost to the cultural standards of our society, and with hardly any importance given to fostering and encouraging local cultural expression in especially in films and teledramas.

For several years the worst of Bollywood and the very dregs of the Tamil Nadu film industries, bought on the cheap have been loaded on our people, almost addicting them to the lowest forms of cultural expression, earning several times the original price of the films by way of sponsorship, for the channels.

The demand that some action be taken to curb this, as well as the surfeit of foreign teledramas, both with hastily done sub-titles or badly dubbed in Sinhala, has been growing for some time. The Tamil community too has been concerned about the poor quality of Tamil films shown on TV channels, where no subtitles or dubbing is required.

The knee-jerk opposition to the new taxes, together with the anti-government political overtones the protest is taking shows that these TV channels, are not prepared to even consider the reasoning behind the imposition of these taxes. They have no interest in the protection or encouragement of local cultural expression.

They see no need to bring more quality into local teledrama, as much as they see nothing wrong with cultural hogwash that is shown by way of cinema on their channels. They would rather prefer to wallow in this cultural pigswill, as long as it brings them the required profit, while cultural standards are lowered daily, the local electronic entertainment industries are smothered, with little incentive for investment in quality TV entertainment made locally.

The censor bogey

Not surprisingly, the UNP has taken cudgels against the Government, particularly on behalf of the private TV channels. The UNP has suddenly discovered an insidious censorship being imposed by the Government through these taxes. It says nothing about the aspect of culture that led to the taxes being imposed, possibly because it is a party divorced from the cultural norms of Sri Lanka, as we have seen it demonstrate so often.

Once again the UNP is reading the script all wrong and coming to conclusions that can only help its corporate financiers and willing electronic propagandists. But there is something the UNP and the TV channels that oppose these taxes should know.

It is the truth that Sri Lanka is not alone among democracies that take regulatory measures to safeguard one's own national product on TV, and even the cinema, against foreign competition, especially of the cheap and vulgar type; Canada and France are two vibrant democracies that have taken such steps. So much for Ranil Wickremesinghe's latest bogey of censorship, which can only make them even more ridiculous than they already are in the public eye.

UNESCO

More significant than the UNP's railing about censorship through taxation is the fact that the new regulations introduced by the Government are very much in keeping with the UNESCO Convention on the protection and promotion of the diversity of cultural expressions of 2005, to which Sri Lanka is a signatory.

Article 6 of the Convention on the "Rights of parties at the national level" stats that "each Party may adopt measures aimed at protecting and promoting the diversity of cultural expressions within its territory."

These methods, among others, may include the following:

(a) regulatory measures aimed at protecting and promoting diversity of cultural expressions;

(b) measures that, in an appropriate manner, provide opportunities for domestic cultural activities, goods and services among all those available within the national territory for the creation, production, dissemination, distribution and enjoyment of such domestic cultural activities, goods and services, including provisions relating to the language used for such activities, goods and services;

(c) measures aimed at providing domestic independent cultural industries and activities in the informal sector effective access to the means of production, dissemination and distribution of cultural activities, goods and services;

(d) measures aimed at providing public financial assistance;

(e) measures aimed at encouraging non-profit organizations, as well as public and private institutions and artists and other cultural professionals, to develop and promote the free exchange and circulation of ideas, cultural expressions and cultural activities, goods and services, and to stimulate both the creative and entrepreneurial spirit in their activities;

(f) measures aimed at establishing and supporting public institutions, as appropriate;

(g) measures aimed at nurturing and supporting artists and others involved in the creation of cultural expressions;
It is evident the strident opponents of the new taxes either have no knowledge of this UNESCO Convention, or prefer to keep mum about it, knowing that all their arguments against the taxes fall flat in the face of these clauses.
The Government is obviously well within its fiscal, and more importantly its cultural rights, in imposing these taxes. If there are any TV channels genuinely and gravel hurt by them, they should negotiate a lower level of taxes, for a specified period, till they get their cultural act together, after which the Government can have the right to impose the taxes in full measure.

The same goes for the advertising industry too, which too is howling in pretended pain, little realizing how much of money is wasted to get commercials done abroad, to ensure so-called "aspirational" value, and reinforce foreign aspects of branding in TV advertising locally.

They too must learn to pay for the damage they do to local talent. TV channels should stop their howling and show the public their accounts, so that we can know for sure that these taxes will lead them to bankruptcy.
