The activist group Avaaz has delivered over 21,000 letters from Canadians to the country’s broadcast regulator demanding no special treatment for Sun TV.
The U.S.-based group dropped off the letters at CRTC headquarters on Friday–the last day for citizen interventions.
The CRTC is holding a public hearing Nov. 19 to determine if the conservative Sun TV News–dubbed by some as “Fox News North”–will be granted a must-carry designation.
That would force cable and satellite companies to carry the company’s signal for up to the first three years of its life.
Avaaz–with a stated mission to “organize citizens everywhere to help close the gap between the world we have and the world most people want”–says Sun TV should have to earn its place on the dial by attracting sufficient viewers so that carriers will want to include it.
The group says the response from Canadians who wrote individualized objections to the application is unprecedented.
It says 30,000 people clicked the online petition, but the organization only printed out and delivered those who had added individual appeals.
The petition caused controversy last month after Avaaz asked police to investigate tampering from someone with an Ottawa-based web address who was adding fake names.
The issue came up again when Sun TV executive Kory Teneycke resigned in September. Teneycke, a former spokesman for Prime Minister Stephen Harper, said he had become a source of controversy in parent company Quebecor‘s bid for the TV licence.
