Lusa news agency restructuring violates independence standards, regulator rules

The Portuguese media regulator, Entidade Reguladora para a Comunicação Social (ERC), has ruled that the restructuring of the Lusa news agency does not comply with applicable legal frameworks or best practices for the independent operation of a public media outlet. The ERC stated that this non-compliance is expected to have significant impacts on the perception of Lusa’s independence from political power at national, European, and international levels throughout the current four-year board mandate.

The ruling follows a complaint filed by the Journalists' Union (Sindicato dos Jornalistas) in April, which argued that new statutes governing the agency’s management model threatened press freedom. The union highlighted that the new structure expanded the Board of Directors to three members, all appointed by the Government on behalf of the State, without sufficient safeguards for transparency or public scrutiny. The union is now calling on the Government to ensure the regular statutory functioning of the agency and to protect editorial autonomy from partisan interests.