The Council of the Regulatory Body for Electronic Media (REM) should play a key role in the control of electronic media. The president of NUNS, Željko Bodrožić, says, however, that during the election of members of the SNS Council, he implements complete lawlessness because he wants to secure a majority at any cost.
“Applications sent by individuals and associations are generally rejected or not discussed at all. In the process of selecting the Council of REM has always been ruling party, not only this one but also the previous one, saw that through the alleged inclusive process, it has an obedient majority that will not do its job in full capacity,” says Bodrožić for “Vreme”.
The majority in the Council is set up in a position where they should be silent and raise their hand as the President of the Council decides.
“It’s nice to say that it’s now the Wild West, that it’s Kansas City 200 years ago, where even though there are some laws, they don’t apply and they simply created a scene that sinks deeper and deeper. No one even pays attention to the Code anymore, the journalism profession is completely ruined,” he explains.
He adds that in this “time of Vučić” the local television and radio scene is completely occupied and there are no more free local and regional television stations.
“Everything is theirs, and the programs are based on easy entertainment and propaganda.”
Bodrožić says that our media scene deviates from normality.
“Normal television and radio stations are exceptions, which confirm the rule that 99 percent of the scene is under full control and does not at all fulfill the task of public media.”
“What can we say about a country where cultural content does not exist on any television with a national frequency?” he concludes.
Ruling party candidates
One of the candidates for the Council of REM, is the owner of a media production. This is the case of the candidacy of the adviser to the Minister of Information, Miloš Garić.
“What can I say, they know what the law is, what it says, but they interpret it as they want. In recent years, Garić has been in the service of the ruling party, with his production and public activities. He participated in the creation of media policy and now suddenly, as a proven progressive, he is coming as an independent candidate,” explains Bodrožić.
“Our independent scene was now a little more organized and there is no party that was involved in the selection of candidates. With them, you can see that there is one center that sets up the proposers and chooses the candidates”, he says and adds that these candidates are from the ruling political party and that “they want to smear ours with mud at the start, by saying that they are opposition”.
Illegal government candidates
The executive director of the Slavko Ćuruvija Foundation, Ivana Stevanović, explains to “Vreme” what the problems are related to proposing candidates to the REM Council.
“This process is problematic because not only do we have repeated attempts to plant candidates who do not meet not only the basic legal requirements, but also the ethical and moral standards to be in a body like this, but also because the government shows that it has no intention of implementing a fair, legal process for electing members of the REM Council,” she says.
“It is obvious that they have no intention of learning any lessons, but actually completely ignore all principles and legal obligations,” says Stevanović.
“This period without the REM Council is a complete Wild West and there is no one to react, and even when there is, they don’t react. They are under the direct control of the authorities, they will not punish Pink, and if it was according to the law, it would have been shut down a hundred times by now,” adds Bodrožić.
Law in the hands of political will
“We are now waiting for the Committee to accept candidatures or reject them. They should work according to the law and reject candidates who have not achieved the qualifications to be candidates at all – who are politically active and/or have no connection with the electronic media. In the Committee for Culture and Information, the majority is from the Progressive Party with all its satellites, so they can also vote that the Earth is flat,” concludes Bodrožić.
“This is a last attempt to resolve the matter. I appeal and call on them to come to their senses and ensure the implementation of the law. We are currently in a situation where the highest legislative body consciously and intentionally ignores its legal obligations,” Stevanović points out.
He reminds that they filed a criminal complaint against the most responsible person in the Board, Nevena Đurić, due to the suspension of the Law regarding the deadlines for announcing the competition.
“The prosecutor’s office has the opportunity to intervene if it wants to preserve the basic rule of law in this country. Obviously, it is nobody’s business here.”
“I don’t have too much confidence in the Board because it has already shown on many levels how it intends to work. I have no confidence that they will suddenly wake up to protect the legality of the process, but here I invite them to really think a little about where their actions are leading and the situation in which the highest legislative body in the country decides to arbitrarily suspend or ignore its legal obligations,” underlined Stevanović.
Political control over elections in REM
Bodrožić claims that the previous competition was canceled, even though it was “clean as a tear”, and the reason for this is not the clearest.
“They didn’t bother to find any reason, but the competition was canceled allegedly due to public dissatisfaction. That’s why a process that is clean as a tear is not canceled, right? Why would the state do something like that and spend citizens’ money again, if something was so clean? How can you cancel the competition if everything was according to the law? Then they decided to – ‘please’ the citizens and start the process again,” he claims.
When nominating candidates, associations appear that have no activity and are not recognized as associations that have been active in their fields for a long time.
“Here in our country, in the segment of journalistic associations, we have the two largest associations, UNS and NUNS, which cover 90-something percent of journalists, and they were outvoted by two associations from Niš – the Association of Journalists from Niš and the professional Association of Journalists of Serbia from Niš are two organizations that are under the direct control of Minister Gašić,” Bodrožić points out.
He is just waiting for the moment when “Seselj will speak from them again, and it is close.”
Bodrožić believes that they can put them in a situation where they can come to an agreement and get out of the process they entered again, because “the students pulled it off”.
“In that case, I hope that the European Commission will react again and that they will see that they are again at work with fraud and that they will not be recognized by the REM Council,” he adds.
“The good thing is that we made some coordination, the civil sector woke up a bit, the media associations stood by each other and it is very significant that the UNS not only supported our candidates, but also registered the same two candidates, so we are now stronger in terms of coordination,” underlines Bodrožić.
Everything will be clear after the Board meeting scheduled for Friday.
Source: Vreme
