The COIT recommends improvements in the election of directors and president of RTVE

The Official College of Telecommunications Engineers (COIT) has transferred to the Bureaus of the Congress of Deputies and the Senate, and to the parliamentary spokespersons of all the Political Groups a series of recommendations on the selection process of candidates for directors and president of the Corporation.

Since the function of the Official College of Telecommunications Engineers is to represent and defend the interests of Telecommunications Engineers, and taking into account that their professional activity is crucial in the processes of digital transformation and application of new information and communication technologies, the COIT has developed a series of recommendations that aim to improve the professional and technical future of RTVE.

It should be remembered that in 2006, RTVE ceased to be a Public Entity to become a State Mercantile Company, subject to the regulation of Capital Companies and the Workers' Statute. However, in these 14 years, in the opinion of the COIT "the essential change in corporate culture has not taken place, which has led to negative assessments of numerous aspects of its management by the Court of Auditors; the National Commission on Markets and Competition, and the Delegated Intervention of the Treasury".

The COIT considers that in the organization of this Public tender for the selection process of aspiring directors and president of RTVE there were important deficiencies that limited the criteria of equality, merit and ability, being de facto a restricted competition, since it reserved for journalists working at RTVE the necessary score to move on to the second phase. This meant that, even if they were admitted to the competition, the rest of the professionals, such as engineers, economists or lawyers, to name just a few examples, were excluded in practice, for whom it was impossible, according to the established scale, to achieve such a score.

"Among the excluded professionals are the Telecommunications Engineers themselves, whose academic training and professional experience qualify them in a very special way to collaborate in the management of any type of Operator that acts in the communications sector, as is the case of RTVE, precisely a public entity that faces a very competitive audiovisual market where technological developments will be critical for its future. In addition, from the COIT we will always advocate for plurality and equal opportunities, especially if it is about professional access to public entities or companies," says the Association in a statement.

In his opinion, the figure of the Telecommunications Engineer is not only fully capable of providing important added value in the decisions that could be taken from the RTVE Board, but also that his possible presence in this body would have all the logic to better face the use of the technologies of digitalization. such as Artificial Intelligence, the Internet of Things, Big Data management...

The Association has sent a series of recommendations to the Bureaus of the Congress of Deputies and the Senate, and to the Political Parties. In order to respect the rights of the 95 people admitted to the Competition, They ask to annul the pre-selection made at the time, since it did not guarantee the conditions of equality, merit and capacity of all the contestants; as well as to entrust, to an entity specialized in management personnel selection processes, the preparation of a New catalogue of professional merits necessary to direct RTVE effectively and efficiently, in accordance with article 14 of the current Law 17/2006, and apply it to all accepted candidacies. The 10 best scored would become part of the Board of Directors, and the General Courts would elect, from among them, the one who will exercise the Executive Presidency of RTVE.

They also recall that in accordance with Article 9.3 of the Constitution, no Public Institution can act with discretion in a process such as this. According to this, the Cortes could not call an open and competitive competition in order to "pre-select" 20 candidatures and then apply other non-bankruptcy criteria to choose 10. Unless there is a better criterion, a merit-based competition requires scrupulous respect for the result.
Alternatively, if this review is not legally possible, we suggest that the Competition be annulled and a new call be made, rather than consummating a pre-selection vitiated by serious irregularities, which could lead to a more than probable correction by the high Spanish judicial instances.

The COIT understands that it does not seem advisable to return to the "traditional" method of appointing Council members through quotas more or less proportional to the political composition of the Chambers, since democratic control over the RTVE Corporation is already amply guaranteed by the obligation to comply with the contents of the Framework Mandate still in force issued by the Parliament on December 18, 2007; by the supervision of the Joint Congress-Senate Commission, which is responsible for monitoring the correct adaptation of RTVE to the principles of "Independence, Pluralism, Neutrality, Impartiality and Rigor" on a monthly basis; and by the Delegated Intervention of the Treasury, the Court of Auditors, the IGAE and the CNMC, which control and supervise the various aspects of internal management.

Finally, it calls for the figure of open, democratic and transparent Public Competition to be extended to all public companies, with absolute respect for the criteria of equality, merit and capacity, as it seems the most appropriate to facilitate the incorporation of qualified people from Civil Society into the professionalised management of any Public Enterprise, for the benefit of the efficient use of public resources; to guarantee their independence, and for the good of the general interests of the population.

Other articles about COIT, RTVE