1st Private TV Outlet in Spain Tweaks Regime
Spain’s first private TV station to begin regular programming broke the state’s 33-year monopoly with a newscast that immediately took the government to task last week.
Antena 3 de Television is one of three private companies that gained a license in August from the government of Socialist Prime Minister Felipe Gonzalez.
During the first broadcast, beamed only to Madrid and Barcelona, announcer Miguel Angel Nieto wasted little time in showing that the new station will follow the strongly anti-government line of its national radio network.
“We cannot ask your forgiveness for not appearing in all of Spain,” Nieto said. “The government simply will not let us.”
Antena 3 and the other two private stations, all legally required to begin regular programming by April 3, are broadcast through a state-owned telecommunications network, which officials say is to cover the entire country by late 1991.
Parliament voted to create three private stations in 1988. Until last week, most Spaniards received three channels, two run by the national government and the third run by their regional government.
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