The Council of State deemed the appeal of the C8 channel against the upcoming loss of its TV frequency “inadmissible” because it was filed before the finalization of the procedure by Arcom, the audiovisual regulator, said -he announced on Friday.
This reasoning also applies to the channels NRJ12 and Le Média, which also contest the preselection established by Arcom for the allocation of frequencies. All three will be able to file a new appeal when the regulator announces its final list in December.
At this stage, the Council of State judges the requests of C8, NRJ12 and Le Média “inadmissible because premature”, he indicated in a press release.
For the reallocation of 15 television frequencies in 2025, Arcom unveiled a preselection at the end of July. The independent regulatory authority had ruled out the renewal of the frequencies of NRJ12 and C8, whose lease expires at the end of February, and had not retained the radical left web television Le Média.
According to the Council of State, this “pre-selection list” constitutes “neither attribution for the candidates appearing there, nor definitive rejection for the others”, and cannot therefore be attacked.
To go to court, it is necessary, according to him, to wait for the final list that Arcom must publish after the conclusion of agreements with the new frequency holders.
“Only the final decisions of Arcom, which should take place in December, will definitively establish the candidates selected for DTT (digital terrestrial television, Editor’s note)and these may be contested before the Council of State, including urgently,” argued the highest administrative court.
As expected, Cyril Hanouna reacted in “TPMP”. The host believes that “all this looks like a huge scam and leaves 400 families of employees in the dark”. C8 has launched a petition to request that its frequency be maintained. It had 830,000 signatures as of Friday afternoon.
In the Arcom preselection, two newcomers were preferred to C8 and NRJ12: OFTV (Ouest-France group) and RéelsTV (CMI France, from Czech billionaire Daniel Kretinsky).
