TORONTO – CTV Newsnet issued an apology late Thursday to former Quebec premier Lucien Bouchard for announcing he was dead.
“CTV Newsnet has formally extended its sincerest apologies to Mr. Lucien Bouchard and his family. The apology followed an erroneous report today by CTV Newsnet that Mr. Bouchard had passed away. The report was quickly retracted. Furthermore, the CTV Newsnet report incorrectly attributed the source of the information to Radio-Canada,” says the CTV correction.
The report was corrected within just a few minutes of its initial airing.
Radio-Canada was pretty miffed itself, issuing its own statement so that people would know that despite what Newsnet said, neither Radio-Canada nor RDI announced that Bouchard had died. In fact, he was in his law office Davies, Ward, Phillips and Vineberg, working all day.
“CTV Newsnet directly quoted Radio-Canada as having announced the death of former Quebec premier Lucien Bouchard this afternoon. In reality, however, this news was not reported at any time by either Radio-Canada or RDI, its 24-hour information network. Given the significance of this false report, Radio-Canada has asked CTV for a public retraction,” said the release.
