Corporacion Extremena de Medios Audiovisuales (CEXMA)

The Corporación Extremeña de Medios Audiovisuales (CEXMA) is the public broadcaster of Extremadura, based in Mérida. Law 4/2000 of 16 November created the public undertaking; Law 3/2008 of 16 June replaced that law to adapt the corporation to digitalisation and remains its governing statute. The Junta de Extremadura owns it, and under its organisation and functioning regulation operational management is delegated to a subsidiary, Sociedad Pública de Radiodifusión y Televisión Extremeña, SAU. Dámaso Castellote Caballero has been Director General since the Asamblea de Extremadura elected him on 2 December 2021.

Media assets

Television: Canal Extremadura TV, which recorded an average audience share of 4.4% in 2024 and 5.3% at its November peak, with its EXN news programme averaging 11.3%.

Radio: Canal Extremadura Radio.

Digital: canalextremadura.es, which recorded 16.65 million page views in 2024, 522,253 social-media followers and 25,729 active app users.

Ownership and governance

Law 3/2008 was amended by Law 18/2010 of 28 December, which modified Article 16 and added two further provisions. The corporation’s organisation and functioning regulation was approved by Decree 164/2004 of 9 November and modified by Decree 28/2018 of 13 March; it records that CEXMA comprises a Board of Directors made up of the groups represented in the Asamblea and an Advisory Council as its participation body.

Under Article 7.1 the Board has nine members elected by two-thirds of the deputies of the Asamblea de Extremadura. Every parliamentary group must have at least one representative, members are chosen for their professional merits with regard to political pluralism, and their four-year term ends with the legislature. The Board decides by simple majority as a rule, while important decisions, among them its own organisational rules and specified programming and budgetary matters, are subject to reinforced-majority requirements under Article 8, with statutory fallback arrangements in some cases if agreement cannot be reached.

Article 12.1 provides that the Director General is elected by the Asamblea by three-fifths of the members of the chamber, on the proposal of the Consejo de Gobierno, which then makes the appointment. The term is five years under Article 12.2. The grounds for removal are physical impossibility or illness exceeding six continuous months, manifest incompetence or conduct contrary to the criteria of the law, and conviction by final judgment for an intentional offence; under Article 14.1 removal is decided by the Asamblea, on the proposal of the Consejo de Gobierno and after hearing the Board, by reasoned resolution.

Castellote had twice served as interim director before his election, covering for Beatriz Maesso and Carmen Santos. He took over on an interim basis on 15 July 2021 after Urbano García Alonso resigned to take up a post at RTVE, and the Asamblea elected him on the three-fifths majority on 2 December 2021 on the proposal of the regional government spokesperson responsible for the corporation. His five-year mandate reaches its statutory end in December 2026; under Article 12.2 the outgoing Director General continues in office until a new one is designated.

Carmen Santos, who had been selected through a public competition convened in August 2015, resigned on 8 June 2017, and the Consejo de Gobierno accepted the resignation on 20 June 2017, the government citing her stated inability to carry out the audiovisual project she had presented to that competition.

The Asamblea designated the current nine Board members on 28 December 2023 and the Board was constituted on 20 February 2024: María Felisa Cepeda Bravo, Emilio José Borrega Romero, Ana Fernández-Salguero Elena, José Luis Lucas Rodríguez, María de la Cruz Vázquez Vázquez, Pilar Barrientos Ruiz, Magdalena Nevado del Campo, Miguel Serrano Gálvez and Daniel Hierro Fresno. Fernández-Salguero Elena was made president on the Popular Party’s proposal and Vázquez Vázquez vice-president on the Socialist Party’s.

The Asamblea was dissolved on 27 October 2025 by Decree 8/2025, and the election of 21 December 2025 returned 29 Popular Party seats, 18 Socialist, 11 Vox and seven for Unidas Extremadura, of 65. No party reached the absolute majority of 33, and a Popular Party and Vox government under María Guardiola took office on 30 April 2026. Under Article 7.5 Board members’ terms end with the legislature, which for this purpose is deemed to conclude after the election is held, and outgoing members continue exercising their functions until the new directors take office. No new Board had been designated at this update, so the Board constituted in February 2024 remained in office in a holdover capacity.

The thresholds in this chamber are decisive. Two-thirds of the 65 seats is 44 and three-fifths is 39. The governing Popular Party and Vox hold 40 seats between them, which reaches the majority needed to elect the Director General but falls four short of the majority needed to elect the Board, and Article 7.1 provides no lower-majority fallback for that election.

Source of funding and budget

The corporation depends on the regional government for almost all of its income. Its 2024 report gives these figures below.

Commercial and advertising revenue was 2.2% of the income recorded in those three lines. Content spending rose 12.66% on 2023. The corporation employed 245 people, 114 of them women. The company’s own report put the 2022 budget at EUR 27.6 million.

Editorial independence

The governing statute carries express editorial requirements. Article 2 sets the principles for programming, among them the objectivity, veracity and impartiality of information, respect for political, social, cultural and religious pluralism, and the separation of information from opinion with identification of those holding the opinions and free expression. Article 21 provides that the most significant social and political groups shall have access to broadcasting, on objective criteria including parliamentary representation and political, trade-union, social and cultural presence.

Neither Law 3/2008 nor the organisation and functioning regulation establishes a news council or an editorial statute, and no such body, editorial code or style manual was located for this update.

The participation body is the Consejo Asesor. Article 11.1 gives it 17 members appointed by the Consejo de Gobierno on the proposal of the entities represented: two from the most representative trade unions, two from the most representative business organisations, three from local corporations, four from the regional administration, and six from educational and social institutions and professional press associations. Under Article 11.2 the Board convenes it at least once every six months, and it gives its opinion when the Board expressly requests one or on programming matters. Its composition is published. Its opinions are advisory.

No complaint alleging political interference in CEXMA’s news output during 2025 or 2026 was located for this update. The sources checked were the Diario Oficial de Extremadura, the Asamblea’s published proceedings, the corporation’s own reports and transparency pages, and regional reporting.

AI and digital policy

No CEXMA policy on the use of artificial intelligence in journalism was located for this update, and no deployment of artificial-intelligence tools by the corporation was recorded. Setting out the technology strategy for the corporation’s new headquarters, the Director General described an intention to use artificial intelligence to make content more accessible, to assist documentalists and content creators, and to analyse audience data; that account describes no editorial policy, human-supervision rule or labelling of AI-generated material.

Classification rationale

CEXMA remains classified Independent State-Funded and State-Managed (ISFM).

The Junta de Extremadura owns the corporation and supplies almost all of its income: the current transfer in the 2026 budget is 92.4% of the corporation’s total planned financing for the year. The Asamblea elects both its Board and its Director General.

The appointment thresholds are among the strongest of the Spanish regional broadcasters reviewed in this cycle. The Board requires two-thirds of the deputies, with no lower-majority fallback, and the Director General three-fifths. In the chamber elected in December 2025 the governing Popular Party and Vox hold 40 of 65 seats: enough for the Director General, four short for the Board. Within the Board, important decisions are themselves subject to reinforced-majority requirements under Article 8.

No evidence of a sustained editorial line imposed or approved by state authorities was found for this update, which is the editorial criterion for State-Controlled status. The statute carries express duties of objectivity, veracity and impartiality and an access regime for political and social groups.

September 2026