Czechs Take to the Streets Against Bill That Would Make Public Broadcasters State-Dependent

Tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Prague on May 5 to oppose a government bill that would strip Czech public broadcasters of their financial independence, in the largest protest over media freedom in the country since March.

As České noviny reported, the rally was organised by the civic movement Milion chvilek (Million Moments), which is demanding the withdrawal of legislation that would transfer funding for Czech Television (ČT) and Czech Radio (ČRo) from licence fees to direct state budget allocations. Demonstrators assembled at Old Town Square before marching to the Czech Radio building on Vinohradská Street, carrying banners reading “Free Media”, “Independence Has a Price”, and “Unfree Media Equals an Unfree Country”. The event passed without incident, according to police spokesman Jan Rybanský.

A Bill Critics Call Nationalisation

The legislation, presented by Culture Minister Oto Klempíř of the Motorists party, does more than change the funding mechanism. It would simultaneously cut the broadcasters’ budgets by 1.4 billion crowns for the coming year—one billion from ČT and 400 million from ČRo. To put that in context: licence fees currently form the backbone of both outlets’ revenues, with ČT planning 6.7 billion crowns from fees this year and ČRo nearly 2.5 billion. Shifting that money to state budget allocations would make both broadcasters financially dependent on whichever government holds power — a tool that critics argue could be used to pressure editorial decisions without ever touching a single newsroom directly.

Milion chvilek chair Mikuláš Minář and association member Mariana Novotná Nachtigallová did not mince words at the rally, calling the bill an attempt at “nationalisation of public media” and demanding an end to what they described as political capture of Czech broadcasting. “If politicians do not act, they will see that this is only the beginning,” the movement said.

Unions Reject Claims of a Deal

The march ended outside the Czech Radio building, where staff waved from windows and balconies and held signs thanking the crowd. Jan Křemen, chair of Czech Radio’s strike committee, addressed the demonstrators — and used the moment to flatly contradict an earlier government claim. The Culture Ministry had said that a meeting between unions and Minister Klempíř earlier that day had produced agreement on several key points of the bill. Křemen denied it outright. The unions’ position, he said, has not moved: the current funding model must be preserved in full.

That standoff has been building for weeks. Two weeks before the rally, unions at both ČT and ČRo, together with the Veřejnoprávně initiative, declared an open-ended strike alert over the proposed legislation. A petition launched in late April had gathered roughly 175,000 signatures by the evening of May 5. Student protests in support of public media had already taken place across the country on April 22.

Protests Set to Escalate

Milion chvilek used the Prague rally to announce its next steps. On May 17, the movement plans simultaneous marches in 12 regional cities, starting at 5 p.m. A week after that, a march to the Government Office in Prague is scheduled — bringing the pressure directly to the cabinet’s door.

The trajectory matters. The Prague gathering follows a Milion chvilek demonstration on the Letná plain in March that the organisers said drew a quarter of a million people — one of the largest protests in the country in years. That rally targeted the government’s broader direction: its approach to public media, the non-profit sector, culture, and the disproportionate influence of the smaller coalition partners, ANO’s allies SPD and the Motorists. The media bill has since sharpened that anger into something more specific. Whether the government moves to withdraw the legislation or holds its ground will determine whether what happened on May 5 was a warning — or an opening.