The Post and Electronic Communications Agency of the Republic of Slovenia (APEK) is an independent regulatory authority, which regulates and monitors the fields of electronic communications, postal services and radio and television broadcasting in the Republic of Slovenia. It operates pursuant to current legislation and performs its duties in a public, transparent and friendly manner, to the benefit of the final users and the general public. APEK’s decisions can only be challenged before courts.
The mission of APEK is to regulate the electronic communications and postal market in order to ensure competitiveness and thus make it possible to choose high-quality, modern and affordable services and a variety of radio and television programme services. The objective is to ensure equality for operators of communications networks and service providers and providers of postal services, to manage the radio-frequency spectrum and number range, to monitor the content of radio and television programme services and protect the rights of users in both the Republic of Slovenia and the European Union. It is financed by fees, collected from telecommunication and broadcasting operators.
APEK has powers to manage telecommunications and broadcasting spectrum, regulate the postal services market, settle disputes among operators on prices, infrastructure etc., set the prices of some services, decide on concentration in certain cases, collect the fees from operators, supervise telecommunications and broadcasting operators. Besides that, APEK is competent for accreditation of electronic signatures.
In the area of broadcasting, APEK manages the radiofrequency spectrum and supervises the content as to ensure pluralism of broadcasting media and content. It issues licenses for performing radio and television activities to radio and television broadcasters, conducts public tenders for obtaining radio frequencies for analogue broadcasting and public tenders for obtaining the right to disseminate programme in digital broadcasting technique. The selection between interested broadcasters is made on the basis of a grounded proposal by the Broadcasting Council and in accordance with the act regulating electronic communications. APEK also grants statuses of special importance to radio and TV stations which comply with the requirements for local, regional, student or non-profit station of special importance and submits national strategy on development of radio and television.
Within the framework of expert supervision the Agency monitors the compliance with the programme requirements and restrictions that apply to radio and television programme services under the Mass Media Act (e.g. proportions of programme, advertising quota, protection of minors) and supervises the implementation of the legal provisions on radio and television programme services with statuses of special importance.
APEK also provides support to two independent councils: one for electronic communications and the other for broadcasting. Both councils have a power to give or refuse their consent to APEK’s statutes.
The Broadcasting Council is an independent expert body, which consists of seven members, appointed by the National Assembly on the basis of a public invitation. The term of office for the members is five years. They may be reappointed after the expiry of the term of office. Technical, expert, financial and administrative support for the operation of the Broadcasting Council is provided by APEK.
The role of the Broadcasting Council is to provide APEK with initiatives for the conduct of expert supervision of the implementation of programme requirements and restrictions specified in the Mass Media Act and with a grounded proposal for the selection of providers through public tenders for the allocation of radio frequencies for the broadcasting. It also provides the Agency and the relevant ministry with a preliminary opinion on various subjects: on the issue, transfer and revocation of the decision on the performance of radio and television activity, on the assignment or revocation of the status of special importance and on the limitation of concentration.
The Broadcasting Council also assesses the situation in the area of radio and television programme services, proposes the method and criteria for formulating the list of events of public importance in the Republic of Slovenia and formulates the proposal for the content of the list. It proposes detailed criteria for defining local and regional programme, the procedure and conditions for acquiring the status of special importance and criteria for in-house production and other contents of radio and television programme services, specified in the Mass Media Act, to the responsible minister.
The Broadcasting Council also draws up an annual report or assessment of the situation in the area of broadcasting and proposals for improving the situation for the National Assembly.
The licence for performing television or radio activities (Article 105 of Mass Media Act)
Only a broadcaster who holds the licence for particualr radio or television programme service (licence for performing television or radio activities for this service, hereinafter: the licence) can be granted the right to use the radio frequencies for analog broadcasting or the right to be present in a digital multiplex.
All the broadcasters, wishing to obtain the right to be present in a digital multiplex, must therefore hold the licence for the programme service they are tendering, before they submit their tender.
This licence is issued by APEK to a broadcaster for radio or television programme service that meets the following conditions: registered radio or television activities and the decision of the Ministry of Culture on the entry of the radio or television programme in the register of media. The application for the licence must contain data on the type of activity (radio or television), the name of the programme service and the programme requirements that the broadcaster must fulfil during dissemination of the programme service.
Programme requirements that must be defined in the application and the conditions under which they can be changed are stipulated in a secondary act issued by APEK (available in Slovenian language on APEK website).
How to obtain the right for a programme to be present in a digital multiplex
TV channels can obtain the right to be present in a digital multiplex through public tenders, which are conducted by APEK. The final selection of the program services is made on the basis of a grounded proposal by the Broadcasting Council and in accordance with the act regulating electronic communications. The Agency decides on the submitted offers by issuing a decision on the selection of broadcasters and grants the selected broadcasters the right to be present in a digital multiplex .
The conditions and criteria for the selection of TV channels for digital broadcasting on the tendered area are laid down by APEK in agreement with the Broadcasting Council.
The criteria that shall be taken into account in the process of selection between the interested broadcasters on a public tender are the diversity of the programme offered in terms of genre and theme, the proportion of in-house production, the amount of production of Slovenian audio-visual works for television programme or the amount of Slovenian music for radio programme, the duration (scope) of the programme service and adequately balanced reporting in daily informative programme. Priority shall be given to the programme services that are already broadcasted via analogue broadcasting radio frequencies in the tendered area and to free-to-air (not encoded) programmes.
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