See also: VRT (broadcaster) § History
The National Institute of Radio Broadcasting (French: INR, Institut national belge de radiodiffusion; Dutch: NIR, Belgisch Nationaal Instituut voor de Radio-omroep), the state-owned broadcasting organisation was established by law on 18 June 1930, and from 1938 was housed in the Flagey Building, also known as the Radio House, a purpose-built building in the "paquebot" style of Art Deco architecture.45
On 14 June 1940, the INR was forced to cease broadcasting as a result of the German invasion. The German occupying forces, who now oversaw its management, changed the INR's name to Radio Bruxelles. A number of INR personnel were able to relocate to the BBC's studios in London from where they broadcast as Radio Belgique / Radio België under the Office de Radiodiffusion Nationale Belge (RNB) established by the Belgian government in exile's Ministry of Information.
At the end of the war the INR and the RNB coexisted until 14 September 1945, when a Royal Decree merged the two and restored the INR's original mission. The INR was one of 23 broadcasting organisations that founded the European Broadcasting Union in 1950. Television broadcasting from Brussels began in 1953, with two hours of programming each day. Split along linguistic lines in 1960, the INR's French-language programming became RTB (Radio-Télévision Belge, Emissions françaises) and moved to new quarters at the Reyers building in 1967. The RTB's first broadcast in colour, Le Jardin Extraordinaire (a gardening and nature programme), was transmitted in 1971. Two years later, the RTB began broadcasting news in colour.
In 1977, broadcasting became a concern for Belgium's language communities, rather than the national government as a whole. Accordingly, the French-language section of the RTB became the RTBF (Radio-Télévision Belge de la Communauté française) and a second television channel was set up with the name RTbis.6 In 1979 RTbis became Télé 2.7 Along with French channels TF1, Antenne 2, FR3 and Swiss channel TSR, the RTBF jointly established the European French-speaking channel TV5 in 1984. On 21 March 1988, Télé 2 became Télé 21.8 On 27 September 1989 a joint-venture company of the RTBF and Vivendi was set up with the name Canal Plus TVCF, which subsequently became Canal Plus Belgique in May 1995. In 1993, Télé 21 was replaced by Arte/21 and Sports 21.
In mid-January 2010, the RTBF adopted the new branding of RTBF.be in its main logo.9 The change was made because of the growing importance of new media; the ".be" suffix stressed those new developments.
On 11 June 2013, the RTBF was one of the few European public broadcasters to join in condemning the closure of Greece's public broadcaster, ERT.
By 2011, the analogue systems for RTBF.be were planned to be phased out for Wallonia.
Main article: Flemish Secession hoax
On 13 December 2006, at 20:21 CET (19:21 UTC), the RTBF replaced an edition of its regular current affairs programme Questions à la Une with a fake special news report in which it was claimed that Flanders had proclaimed independence, effectively dissolving the Belgian state. The programme had been preceded by a caption reading "This may not be fiction", which was repeated intermittently as a subtitle to the images on the screen. After the first half-hour of the 90-minute broadcast, however – by which point RTBF.be's response line had been flooded with calls – this was replaced with a caption reading "This is fiction".
The video featured images of news reporters standing in front of the Flemish Parliament, while Flemish separatists waved the flag of Flanders behind them. Off to the side, Francophone and Belgian nationalists were waving Belgian flags. The report also featured footage of King Albert and Queen Paola getting on a military jet to Congo, a former Belgian colony.
The RTBF justified the hoax on the grounds that it raised the issue of Flemish nationalism, but others felt that it raised the issue of how much the public can trust the press.
In September 2024, French Community of Belgium Minister of Media Jacqueline Galant criticized RTBF for airing a segment titled "How to be less racist?", which in her opinion was biased and lacked pluralism. Galant was in turn criticized by the European Federation of Journalists for alleged editorial interference.1011
RTBF notably caused controversy in January 2025 by delaying the broadcast of Donald Trump's second inaugural speech by two minutes, in order to prevent the live broadcast of statements inciting hatred. The decision was condemned as censorship by Reformist Movement party leader Georges-Louis Bouchez and prompted an investigation from Galant.121314
Television channels are transmitted:
The Video on demand (VOD) offer of the RTBF is available on several platforms:
The RTBF broadcasts radio channels in either analogue format (FM and digital format (using DAB and DVB-T). All channels are also broadcast live over the Internet.
They also have a TMC service transmitted on Classic 21.
Media related to RTBF at Wikimedia Commons
"La RTBF organise un examen de recrutement de journalistes". RTBF. Retrieved 13 April 2022. https://www.rtbf.be/article/la-rtbf-organise-un-examen-de-recrutement-de-journalistes-6910783 ↩
Lovens, Pierre-François. "La RTBF passe à l'offensive politique contre le projet bruxellois X 2". La Libre.be. Retrieved 13 April 2022. https://www.lalibre.be/culture/medias-tele/2004/09/01/la-rtbf-passe-a-loffensive-politique-contre-le-projet-bruxellois-x-2-ENHZKX3SINA3DP2AZFSSZWL5ZY/ ↩
Lovens, Pierre-François. ""BXL" : RTL met la RTBF en garde". La Libre.be. Retrieved 13 April 2022. https://www.lalibre.be/culture/medias-tele/2004/09/25/bxl-rtl-met-la-rtbf-en-garde-KRETNDZBA5HAHCJLNBMRHQIZ2A/ ↩
"Le Flagey, the former Maison de la Radio". Brussels Life. 5 July 2012. Retrieved 9 May 2021. https://www.brusselslife.be/en/article/le-flagey-the-former-maison-de-la-radio ↩
"The Flagey Building". Flagey. Retrieved 8 May 2021. https://www.flagey.be/en/page/3718-the-flagey-building ↩
Schaerbeek 02/737 21 11, RTBF Boulevard Auguste Reyers 52 1044. "1977 : La RTB devient RTBF". RTBF Entreprises. Retrieved 13 April 2022.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) https://www.rtbf.be/entreprise/article_1977-la-rtb-devient-rtbf?id=3568 ↩
Schaerbeek 02/737 21 11, RTBF Boulevard Auguste Reyers 52 1044. "1988 : Naissance de Télé 21". RTBF Entreprises. Retrieved 13 April 2022.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) https://www.rtbf.be/entreprise/article_1988-naissance-de-tele-21?id=3570 ↩
La RTBF devient RTBF.BE dès ce mercredi, La Libre Belgique, 12 January 2010 http://www.lalibre.be/culture/medias-tele/la-rtbf-devient-rtbf-be-des-ce-mercredi-51b8b580e4b0de6db9b9bab0 ↩
"Tweets sur la RTBF: Jacqueline Galant sort du silence". 7sur7 (in French). Retrieved 17 February 2025. https://www.7sur7.be/belgique/tweets-sur-la-rtbf-jacqueline-galant-sort-du-silence~a5c65eb1/ ↩
"Public Broadcaster RTBF Subjected to Ministerial Interference". European Federation of Journalists. Retrieved 17 February 2025. https://fom.coe.int/en/alerte/detail/107641508 ↩
Santos, Gauvain Dos (21 January 2025). "Georges-Louis Bouchez très critique envers la RTBF suite à l'investiture de Trump : "Des petits chefs de la pensée"". La Libre.be (in French). Retrieved 17 February 2025. https://www.lalibre.be/belgique/politique-belge/2025/01/21/georges-louis-bouchez-tres-critique-envers-la-rtbf-suite-a-linvestiture-de-trump-des-petits-chefs-de-la-pensee-KD7XE7ULLJHTVHSKTHO7H7PMHQ/ ↩
Belga, Belga (22 January 2025). "Diffusion de l'investiture de Trump: la ministre Galant attend des explications de la RTBF". La Libre.be (in French). Retrieved 17 February 2025. https://www.lalibre.be/belgique/politique-belge/2025/01/22/diffusion-de-linvestiture-de-trump-la-ministre-galant-attend-des-explications-de-la-rtbf-2QAQEIBGIRG5VNAGBEVS5LBVG4/ ↩
Mokrani, Farah (24 January 2025). "Belgian TV delays Trump speech". Euro Weekly News. Retrieved 17 February 2025. https://euroweeklynews.com/2025/01/24/belgian-broadcaster-sparks-debate-by-delaying-trumps-speech/ ↩
Bouquet Imagin http://www.imagin.lu/television-radio/bouquets-numeriques/bouquet-imagin/ ↩
Included channels, PostTV http://www.tele.lu/eng/Service ↩