02. 04. 2014

SELF-CENSORSHIP DOMINATES SERBIAN JOURNALISM

The poor condition of the Serbian media is caused by the lack of regulation and clear market rules, the participants of the panel on the freedom of media, held today at the European Parliament, jointly concluded.

The European Parliament rapporteur for Serbia Jelko Kacin, one of the event organizers, said that the adoption of media laws is one of the main tasks of the new government. He also said that the Media Strategy was adopted two and half years ago and that the laws are still absent.

According to him, three biggest problems in the Serbian media are self-censorship and the lack of investigative journalism, non-transparency of ownership and the rise of tabloids.

"Media are the foundation of a democratic state", Kacin stressed and added that critical analysis of events is often lacking.

He stated that it often happens that media publish information relating to investigations that should be kept as confidential, which, as he said, poses a threat to the rule of law.

Kacin said that the state of the media will be addressed in the EU accession negotiations in several chapters, including the key chapter 23 on judiciary and fundamental rights.

He emphasized that the attacks against journalists often remain unpunished and welcomed the establishment of the Committee to Investigate Murders of Journalists.

The chief negotiator for the accession of the Republic of Serbia to the EU Tanja Miščević stressed the government's resolve to submit media bills to the parliament as soon as possible, but pointed out that it is more important that those laws to be implemented in practice4.

Ljiljana Smajlović, President of the Journalists' Association of Serbia (UNS), criticized the government for still not taking into consideration the report on corruption in the media by Verica Barać, the late president of the Serbian government's Anti-Corruption Council.

She stated that UNS will require that the media laws incorporate an obligation of the media to disclose their financing, which implies not only the funds received from the government and non-governmental organizations in Serbia, but also from other countries and international organizations.

"We still have no signals that the European Commission will support that, and we have already experienced that if something does not interest Brussels - it does not interest the government either, and the issue will thus not find its way towards legislation", said Smajlović.

Saša Mirković, Assistant Minister of Culture and Information, said that it even after two and a half years since the adoption of the media strategy, Serbia has not passed the relevant laws. However, he stressed that there were two electoral processes and government reshuffles in the meantime.

Mirković said that the draft law on public information, which is the umbrella media law, and the draft law on broadcast media, are undergoing expertise in Brussels and that the ministry awaits comments "any day" to analyze them and incorporate them in the laws.

He added that a working group is active on the harmonization of the text of the third law - that on public service broadcasters - in the part pertaining to financing of the Radio Television of Serbia (RTS) and the Radio Television of Vojvodina (RTV), and that he expects the working group to come forward in the following weeks with a concrete proposal on stabile financing of the two media outlets.

Dragan Janjić, Vice President of the Independent Journalists' Association of Serbia (NUNS), said that the Serbian political elite lost years by not doing anything to improve the situation in the media and the position of the journalists.

Janjić said that tabloidization is a very dangerous problem which does not affect only media, but the whole society as well.

Gordana Igrić, Director of the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN), said that during the rule of the Democratic Party (DS) a very clear system of media control was created, then inherited and developed by successor governments.

According to her, the media have been brought to the situation to give up on unpleasant questions and investigative stories.

"They give up in advance, even before the authorities ask them for anything", said Gordana Igrić.

Several participants in the debate agreed that marketing agencies, often under indirect control of the government, are used as a means of subtle control over the media.

The panel with the title "Speak up, Serbia" in the Foreign Policy Committee of the European Parliament was organized by the Liberal-Democratic group of the European MPs, which Jelko Kacin belongs to.