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Political parties in Ukraine officially own 41 printed media outlets. Unofficially, the number of newspapers etc under their control is many times higher
The political party press has not particularly taken root in independent Ukraine. Of the approximately 30 thousand officially registered printed outlets, only 41 newspapers or journals openly belong to specific parties. This information has just been provided by the Minister of Justice on the Ministry’s website. The Ministry states that many of the main parties and factions do not officially have their own media outlets. While the Ministry acknowledges that de facto many parties and factions have a close working relationship with certain media outlets, it stresses that de jure this press is not considered to be party-owned.
The Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union points out, however, that it would be erroneous to judge merely by official registration. It says that the majority of media outlets are created by individuals who occupy prominent posts in certain parties, and the outlets can effectively be considered party-linked.
It mentions, for example, that one of the main founders of the media holding “MediaDim” [“Media House”] is the head of the Green Party of Ukraine [not necessarily analogous to, say, the German Greens – translator]. The holding controls one television channel, a newspaper and website “24”, an information website “Rupor” and other resources.
The Ministry has provided a list of all officially registered outlets belonging to parties. Since it acknowledges itself that the picture is far from complete, and would seem to suggest a lack of interest among key players in having their own mouthpiece, it might be more useful to refer to the studies delving into the real owners and founders of media outlets. See for example, http://helsinki.org.ua/en/index.php?id=1156173568 and “Who’s living in my telly?” at http://khpg.org/en/1139325984
Given the approaching elections, it would only be fair to name names if we were sure that we could name them all. We would therefore politely suggest only that readers with patience, may find it interesting to try to spot those with a known political, shall we say, interest