Sistema Nacional de Medios Públicos (SINAMP)

The Sistema Nacional de Medios Públicos (SINAMP) is the administrative label used for El Salvador’s state public-media system. It comprises the public television channel Canal 10, the public radio station Radio Nacional / Radio El Salvador 96.9 FM, and the official news brand Noticiero El Salvador, distributed through a website, social media and simulcasts on Canal 10 and Radio El Salvador. Canal 10 originated in the educational television project launched by the Salvadoran state in the 1960s with channels 8 and 10. The project was disrupted by the 1979 military coup and the civil-war period; Canal 8 later declined into a repeater service and stopped transmitting after losing its signal in 1989. Canal 10’s programming spans documentaries, science and educational content, cartoons, talk shows, interviews, films, sports, entertainment and news. Radio Nacional, now branded Radio El Salvador, was founded in 1926 under the call sign AQM and is one of Central America’s historic pioneering radio stations.

Media assets

Television: Canal 10, Noticiero SV

Radio: Radio El Salvador

Ownership and governance

SINAMP is operated directly by the executive. Canal 10, Radio El Salvador and Noticiero El Salvador fall under the Presidency’s communications apparatus, rather than under an autonomous public-service broadcaster. Canal 10 was historically overseen through different state portfolios, including education and culture, depending on the government of the day, but there is no dedicated statute establishing the National Public Media System as an independent public broadcaster. The broadcasting sector as a whole is regulated by the General Superintendency of Electricity and Telecommunications under the Telecommunications Act, but that framework does not provide an arm’s-length governance structure for the state media.

This direct line to the Presidency, with no independent board, no insulating statute and no fixed-term protected leadership, is the core reason SINAMP is classified State-Controlled rather than captured: the outlets are not a public-service institution subject to government influence, but an operating arm of the executive itself.

The wider political environment has hardened the executive’s grip on the information space. President Nayib Bukele, in office since 2019 and serving a second term since 2024, governs with a large legislative majority and under a state of emergency in force since March 2022. His administration has been documented by press-freedom organisations as conducting a sustained campaign against independent media, including punitive tax audits, surveillance, asset freezes and other pressure against the investigative outlet El Faro, as well as the 2025 Foreign Agents Law imposing a 30% levy on foreign-sourced funding. Press-freedom groups reported that dozens of Salvadoran journalists were forced into exile in 2025. Against that backdrop, the state media function as an instrument of official messaging rather than as a counterweight.

Source of funding and budget

SINAMP is funded from the public budget through the Presidency’s communications apparatus. Official budget structures place Radio Nacional and Canal 10 within the Presidency/Communications line rather than in an independently governed public-media fund. Media reporting and budget documentation show that the state audiovisual media have been financed through this executive structure, while the Legislative Assembly in February 2021 asked the Attorney General to investigate the financing of Canal 10 and the state daily Diario El Salvador for possible breaches of budget rules. As an executive-funded operation without ring-fenced or independently governed financing, SINAMP’s resources are controlled by the Presidency.

Editorial independence

SINAMP’s outlets openly favour the government. Noticiero El Salvador, introduced in 2020 on Canal 10 and distributed through the state-media system, has been widely assessed as designed to amplify the administration’s narrative and promote official messaging. RSF describes the executive as running outlets such as the daily Diario El Salvador and the Noticiero El Salvador programme on Canal 10 to disseminate official messaging. Since Bukele took office, state media have also been affected by dismissals and management changes that reinforced executive control.

There is no legal framework guaranteeing the editorial independence of SINAMP. While the El Salvador Journalists Association (APES) maintains a code of ethics intended to apply to all media, SINAMP has no impartial body or mechanism to assess or enforce editorial autonomy, and in practice its output is aligned with the Presidency that owns, funds and directs it.

AI and digital policy

SMM found no evidence that SINAMP or its outlets had published a dedicated public editorial AI-governance policy as of mid-2026.

El Salvador’s national posture on artificial intelligence has been comparatively promotional. In 2025 the country approved a Law for the Promotion of Artificial Intelligence and Technologies (approved by the Legislative Assembly on 26 February 2025 and published in March 2025), oriented toward fostering development, research, investment and application of AI and related technologies, and creating a national AI agency (ANIA) under the Presidency. The government has also promoted AI and technology initiatives as part of its modernisation branding. This national orientation provides context for the state media but is not an editorial standard for their newsrooms.

At outlet level, SINAMP’s digital development has centred on the Noticiero El Salvador brand, with a news website and heavy reliance on social-media distribution, the central vehicle through which the government’s messaging reaches audiences. SMM found no disclosed framework governing the use of AI by Canal 10, Radio El Salvador or Noticiero El Salvador in editorial production, verification, attribution, synthetic-media labelling, recommendation systems or human oversight. Given the system’s role as a direct government communications channel, any AI adoption would in practice be governed by the Presidency’s communications priorities rather than by an independent editorial policy.

Classification rationale

SINAMP is classified State-Controlled (SC), unchanged across SMM cycles. Its outlets are owned and operated directly by the Presidency through its communications apparatus, funded from the executive budget, led without any independent or fixed-term protected governance, and editorially aligned with the government to the point of functioning as an official messaging platform. There is no statute, board or oversight mechanism providing arm’s-length independence. These are the defining determinants of State-Controlled status, and they distinguish SINAMP from a captured public broadcaster that would at least retain a formal public-service structure. The classification is unchanged for 2026, and the surrounding deterioration in El Salvador’s press-freedom environment has reinforced rather than loosened the executive’s control over the state media.

June 2026