Press Council: Text not sufficiently recognizable as a political advertisement

A political advertisement in a newspaper should also be clearly labeled as an advertisement. This is the result of a decision published on Monday by the Swiss Press Council in a case concerning the Baslerstab. On September 22, 2008, the free newspaper belonging to the Basler Zeitung Group published a two-column article with the headline "Spektrum der Parteien" and the headline "Heute: Grünliberale Basel-Stadt". In it, a party representative took a stand against the rent protection initiative of the Basel Tenants' Association.
The association then demanded that a counterstatement be printed, as in its opinion the text contained false statements. However, the Baslerstab rejected this as it was not an editorial contribution. The publisher also stated that it was a paid advertisement, the content of which would only be checked for serious violations.

Danger of confusion with column
The Press Council did not respond to the tenants' association's complaint that its right of reply had been violated due to a lack of jurisdiction for advertisements. However, the Baslerstab had violated the Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Journalists, which requires a clear visual and conceptual separation of editorial content and advertising, with the text of a political party that was not clearly marked as an advertisement. The regular column title and political content could also give rise to the misconception that it was an editorially supervised column.