The Contentious-Administrative Chamber of the TSJA in Granada has declared, through four rulings issued between October and November, the nullity of the call for the public tender for the competitive award of licenses for the provision of audiovisual communication services. private television channel of a commercial and local nature in Andalusia. These decisions, at the expense of presumed appeals before the Supreme Court, leave in the air no less than 101 licenses that were granted for a period of 15 years on April 27, 2022 at the Governing Council of the Board.
At that time, the Junta de Andalucía approved the third local DTT contest, in which a total of 112 licenses had been offered in 45 districts. Among the main winners of the licenses were Publicaciones del Sur, with 20; Communication and Services 101, with 12; Procono, with 5; Pedro Pérez, with 5; Antonio A. Ruiz-Berdejo, with 5, and Listengo, with 4. Other license awards that stood out were those of Sevilla FC and the Real Betis Balompié Foundation. In geographical terms, 14 licenses are granted in the province of Almería, 15 in Cádiz, 16 in Córdoba, 13 in Granada, 8 in Huelva, 8 in Jaén, 15 in Málaga and, finally, 12 in Seville.
The four sentences, against which there is still an appeal, declare the nullity of that call against which five contentious-administrative appeals were filed by television stations that were not awarded the tender. One of those resources was archived, as reported by the Board in April 2022, although another four have now been estimated. If the sentences are ratified by the Supreme Court, in addition to having to call another contest, it is assumed that the damaged television stations that have been operating for a couple of years will also appeal and demand from the Board the return of the millionaire amounts invested (in materials, cameras , sets, technological equipment, etc.) for the following 15 years, as established in the specifications, potentially generating a significant judicial tangle between the original winners and those resulting from the new tender.
This third contest was published in the BOJA extraordinary number 37, of April 27, 2021approving at the same time the specifications that governed it. The Andalusian Government thus met the deadline established in the Law 1/2021, of January 22as highlighted at the time by the Board, by which a transitional period was articulated to guarantee the provision of the local Digital Terrestrial Television service managed by individuals. There are 98 private companies affected by these rulings, according to sources in the process.
Radio planning
The rulings determine that there is no evidence that Andalusia had requested the State to affect the reservation for the public radio and television service. The judges have mainly analyzed whether the reserve had declined and had been excluded from the radioelectric planning affected by the State. That is, if the fact that the available radio spectrum had declined prevented calling a public tender like the one opened by the Board, which is now annulled, leaving all the companies’ investments in the air in addition to the hundreds of jobs that They are now in the air too.
The Ministry of the Presidency, which reported the sentences in an information note distributed last Friday, resolved that contest and boasted of doing so for the first time within the legally established deadline, having been processed entirely electronically. During the processing, 487 requests for participation were received from 54 different bidders. In the call, only 11 licenses had been vacated. Some of them, such as the Andalusian municipalities of Baena, Peñarroya-Pueblonuevo, Priego de Córdoba and Iznalloz, had already been left empty in previous calls.
Nuria López, regional director of television at Procono SA (one of the affected entities) and vice president of the National Association of Telecommunications and Local Television Operators of Spain (Acutel), acknowledges to this newspaper that it has been “a setback” but that the matter still has a “judicial journey.” “We understand that the radio planning reserve has not declined because we have not stopped broadcasting and we are going to continue working and broadcasting because there is no final ruling,” he points out when announcing that his entity will file an appeal. “For whatever reason, there are those who have no interest in giving stability to the sector,” he laments in what represents the third public tender in the same field that has ended up being canceled for the moment.
In April 2006, the Government Council approved the call for the first tender for the granting of concessions for the exploitation of the local public digital terrestrial television service in Andalusia for private management, in which 163 concessions were assigned to natural persons. and legal entities throughout Andalusia. The resolution was challenged and the grants made in more than thirty of the 62 districts were annulled.
The second local DTT contest was held in August 2016, with 111 licenses offered in 44 districts. That call was also challenged, this time by various companies. A total of 89 licenses were granted, but the resolution ended up being canceled by the TSJA, forcing the Board to call a new competition whose bases, at the expense of the challenges before the Supreme Court, have now been annulled.
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