Sistema Nacional de Medios Públicos (former SiBCI)

The Sistema Nacional de Medios Públicos, still widely referred to as the Sistema Bolivariano de Comunicación e Información (SiBCI), is Venezuela’s central state media conglomerate, a government-run system spanning television, radio, print, and digital platforms. It operates under the Ministry of Popular Power for Communication and Information (MIPPCI), which coordinates the state-media system, appoints or influences leadership across its outlets, and centralises official messaging.

SiBCI groups together the state’s flagship broadcasters, including the news and current-affairs channel Venezolana de Televisión (VTV), the generalist channel Televisora Venezolana Social (TVes), the cultural and educational channel ViVe, the local channel Ávila TV, and the Caracas-based international network Telesur. In radio it runs Radio Nacional de Venezuela (RNV) and its family of stations, alongside regional, local, and international services. In print and digital it publishes a set of state newspapers, led by Correo del Orinoco and the Ciudad regional papers, and it owns the state news agency, the Agencia Venezolana de Noticias (AVN). The system was relaunched in early 2026 under the Sistema Nacional de Medios Públicos identity, but its structure and function were unchanged.

Media assets

Television: Nationwide- Venezolana de Televisión, Televisora Venezolana Social (TVes), Vive, ConCiencia TV, 123TV (COVETEL), ShowVen TV; Local- Ávila Televisión; International- Telesur

Radio: Nationawide- Radio Nacional de Venezuela (RNV) (RNV Informativa, RNV Clásica, RNV Musical, RNV Activa, Canal Indígena); Regional- RNV Región Central, RNV Los Llanos, RNV Región Zulia, YVKE Mundial Radio; Local- Alba Ciudad; International- La Radio del Sur

Publishing: Correo del Orinoco, Ciudad CCS, Ciudad VLC, Ciudad Cojedes, Ciudad Guárico, Ciudad Petare, Ciudad BQTO, Ciudad MCY, Ciudad Maturín

News agency: Agencia Venezolana de Noticias (AVN)

Portal: Con el Mazo Dando

Ownership and governance

SiBCI, now presented as the Sistema Nacional de Medios Públicos, operates under the Ministry of Popular Power for Communication and Information (MIPPCI), which coordinates the state-media system, appoints or influences leadership across its outlets, and centralises government messaging. Key posts across the system are filled by people the ministry appoints or who are otherwise tied to it. The ministry also operates a centralised content-distribution network (known as Siscom) through which it circulates messaging lines to state and pro-government outlets, a mechanism documented in reporting during 2024 and 2025 that illustrates how tightly SiBCI’s output is coordinated from the centre.

Telesur, the system’s international arm, began broadcasting in 2005 under President Hugo Chávez as a pan-regional network intended to project Venezuela’s view of Latin America and world affairs. Headquartered in Caracas, it was created as a multi-state venture, with Venezuela holding the controlling stake and effective editorial control. Several partner governments joined or withdrew over time, including Argentina’s 2016 withdrawal.

The ministry’s leadership changed after the country’s January 2026 rupture. Freddy Ñáñez, a long-serving communication minister and former president of VTV, remained in the portfolio until January 2026. After United States forces captured Nicolás Maduro and Delcy Rodríguez assumed acting presidential authority, Rodríguez appointed Miguel Ángel Pérez Pirela, a philosopher and political communicator long associated with pro-government media, as communication minister; he later took on a broader communication and culture role. The change of minister did not alter the structure or function of the state-media system, which remained an instrument of government communication.

Source of funding and budget

The Venezuelan authorities do not publish detailed figures for the funding of individual SiBCI outlets. Some outlets carry advertising, but journalists and independent observers report that the bulk of their financing comes from the state budget, channelled through the ministry. The absence of transparent, disaggregated budget data is itself a feature of the system, and there is no independent commercial base that would give any SiBCI outlet financial autonomy from the government.

Editorial independence

SiBCI’s outlets operate with an editorial agenda set by the ministry, and they present themselves openly as instruments of government communication rather than as independent public-service media. VTV has described its purpose in terms of disseminating state policy in line with the government’s development strategy, and Correo del Orinoco has characterised its relationship with the ministry in similar terms. Independent media organisations and press-freedom groups have consistently described the SiBCI outlets, and VTV in particular as the system’s largest and oldest broadcaster, as vehicles for state propaganda.

The wider environment in which SiBCI operates is one of severe restriction. Under Maduro, local organisations reported that more than 400 media outlets were closed, and an opaque broadcast-frequency policy shut around 200 radio stations. The government has also blocked independent news sites and used the so-called anti-hate law against journalists and critics. In this landscape, SiBCI functions as the amplified voice of the state while independent media are constrained. No statutory framework or independent oversight mechanism guaranteeing the editorial independence of SiBCI has been identified.

Since the January 2026 capture of Nicolás Maduro and Delcy Rodríguez’s assumption of acting presidential authority, the state media apparatus has continued to operate without interruption and has remained under government control, while adjusting its line to the new leadership. On the day of the operation, state channels including VTV and Telesur carried Rodríguez’s addresses denouncing the intervention and describing Maduro as the country’s only president, and state television continued to air pro-Maduro propaganda, broadcasting live images of supporters in Caracas. The system was actively marshalled to manage the crisis: seven days after Maduro’s capture, communication minister Freddy Ñáñez held an emergency meeting with pro-government journalists to set messaging lines, at which Rodríguez laid out her objectives of preserving peace, recovering the detained leaders, and preserving political power. In the months since, the editorial line has shifted with the government: anti-imperialist rhetoric aimed at the United States has largely disappeared from state media, and the interim administration has gradually removed murals, posters, and other symbols associated with Maduro, including replacing his image with a palace seal behind Rodríguez on state broadcasts. There have also been signs of strain inside the apparatus, including the removal from the airwaves of a long-serving state-television host after the capture. These shifts changed the content, not the structure: the system remains a state-controlled instrument serving the government of the day.

AI and digital policy

SiBCI’s outlets distribute heavily across digital and social platforms, and the ministry has built centralised tools, including the Siscom content-distribution app launched in 2024, to coordinate and amplify official messaging online. Venezuela has discussed national AI regulation and published policy guidance, but State Media Monitor found no dedicated editorial AI-governance policy specific to SiBCI or the Sistema Nacional de Medios Públicos, and no evidence that a comprehensive, enforceable AI framework was operational for the state media by mid-2026. The digital apparatus is oriented toward message coordination and reach rather than toward editorial safeguards.

Classification rationale

SiBCI, now the Sistema Nacional de Medios Públicos, is classified State-Controlled because its outlets are owned by the Venezuelan state, operate under a government ministry, are funded predominantly from the state budget, and are directed by ministry-appointed or ministry-tied officials, with no binding editorial firewall or independent oversight. Its outlets openly serve the government’s communication objectives, and the system as a whole is the central instrument of the state’s communicational hegemony.

July 2026