Set up as a multi-state company based in Caracas in Venezuela,
Nueva Televisión
del Sur – better known as TeleSUR – is a television project which states
“the integration of the Latin-American people” as its official aim. The project consists of a
TV channel that is “freely broadcast by satellite” and on its website, which acts as the centre of its multimedia content. The “El Canal” section on their site
introduces TeleSUR as being “the only 100% Latin American information channel, established in 2005 as the reference for communicating our America to the world, with news being broadcast 24/7”.
TeleSUR
started broadcasting on the 24
th July 2005, the anniversary of the birth of
Libertador Simón Bolívar, hero for the independence of South American countries. From the moment the Venezuelan government endorsed the project in 2005, TeleSUR has claimed to be a “Bolivarian” project, revived by Hugo Chávez’s administration, which obtained the support of many left-wing South American State leaders in order to create the channel. TeleSUR has brought together
Venezuela (51% of shares), Néstor Kirchner’s Argentina (20%), Fidel Castro’s Cuba (19%) and Tabaré Vázquez’s
Uruguay (10%) as a multi-state public company
with an initial capital of 2.5 million dollars. 10 million dollars more have been invested in technology by the
Corporación Venezolana del Petróleo, a State company that is a subsidiary of
Petróleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) .
After the victories of both Evo Morales in Bolivia and Rafael Correa in Ecuador, these two countries also joined forces with TeleSUR in
2006 and
2007 respectively. A transfer of 10% of Venezuela’s shares thus completed the channel’s shareholding: Venezuela (41%), Argentina (20%), Cuba (19%), Uruguay (10%), Bolivia (5%) and Ecuador (5%) 2. Since 2007, Daniel Ortega’s Nicaragua has also been considered as a shareholder of TeleSUR, although its exact holding has not been specified. In 2009, Uruguay’s holding was reduced to 7%. Lula da Silva’s
Brazil, concentrating on the launch of its own international TV channel “TV Brasil”, has not become financially involved in TeleSUR, but gives it airtime in Brazil .
Figure 1: Logo and signature of the TV channel TeleSUR
As made apparent by its motto “Our North is the South”, TeleSUR’s emergence is linked to many geopolitical and media issues. The project emerged in the midst of a political situation characterised by the search for South American integration possibilities, within which a grouping of left-wing representatives has given rise to economic, technical and cultural co-operation initiatives at a regional level. The creation of TeleSUR therefore came at the same time as many other multi-state projects, called the “Big National” projects (
grannacionales), instigated by the Venezuelans, such as “The Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA)”, the “People’s Trade Treaty (TCP)”, and the “Bank for the South” or the “Pipeline for the South”, amongst others.
On the media front, this new Latin-American cooperation gives life to the Chavist desire for the “creation of a TV channel that would broadcast worldwide the news and films from the South” . TeleSUR aims to be
“a Latin American media serving the community, which strives to direct and promote the progressive union of the Southern people”. The omnipresence of the “South” as a theme, defined as a “geopolitical concept that promotes the people’s struggle for peace, self-determination, respect, Human Rights and social justice”, implies certain media issues related to the channel’s positioning in relation to an implicit “North”, represented globally by multi-national giants, such as the American channel CNN or its regional arm, CNN in Spanish. TeleSUR’s “Pan-Latin Americanism” project intends to rival a group of “oligopolistic” channels that broadcast their “Latino” versions from Atlanta or Miami in terms of audience and content.
Figure 2: Extract from the launch of TeleSUR’s site in 2006
