28. 05. 2008

VK TELEVISION CREW BANNED FROM KIKINDA CITY HALL

BELGRADE, May 28, 2008 – Association of Independent Electronic Media (ANEM) would thus like to publicly express their protests because journalists of Kikinda-based VK Television were once again prevented from reporting on the events happening in the Kikinda Municipal Assembly building.

The VK Television crew were not allowed to enter the Municipal Government Building in Kikinda for the first time on May 25th, when their attempt to get official data on the number of voters in the second round of the provincial elections from the president of Election Commission was thwarted. On May 27, the security in the municipal building prevented them again from reporting from the previously announced occasion of signing a coalition agreement between the Serbian Radial Party, Democratic Party of Serbia and the Socialist Party of Serbia when they refused to allow them into the building.

ANEM would thus like to point to the fact that, according to the existing Public Information Act, local governments are not only entitled, but also obliged to make information on their work available to the general public, and under the equal conditions for all journalists and all public media organizations.

ANEM would also like to remind the general public that the same Act specifically prohibits any attempt to limit the public information freedom and public information flow, as well as any attempt to exert influence on journalists in order to prevent them from doing their job.

ANEM requests that relevant institutions and bodies investigate this incident involving the Municipal Government in Kikinda in detail, and to provide information to the general public on who ordered the security to ban VK Television crew from the building and prevent them from doing their job, since they had been invited to come and report on the occasion of agreement signing, just like all the other media organizations in Kikinda that managed to make their reports. ANEM would like to send an earnest request to journalists, media and their professional organizations to publicly show their solidarity with the journalists of VK Television.

Saša Mirković,
ANEM President