06. 05. 2015

State broadcaster elects new director

6.5.2015. (B92, Tanjug) - BELGRADE -- The Managing Board of Radio-Television of Serbia (RTS) elected on Tuesday Dragan Bujosevic as new director-general of state broadcaster.

The RTS Managing Board issued a call for applications for the position of the director-general on February 10. Twenty-six candidates submitted their applications, 11 of whom met the formal and legal requirements.

Bujosevic is a journalist, was born in Belgrade in 1954. He graduated from the Faculty of Political Sciences and during his career worked as editor-in-chief of the broadsheet Politika, and a journalist and deputy editor-in-chief of the weekly NIN.

He has received a number of awards: Politika's annual award, the 2001 Duda Timotijevic Award for Excellence in Television Journalism, the 2002 BK Foundation Award for Journalism and Opinion Journalism, the 2008 Stasa Marinkovic Award for Analytical Journalism granted by the Belgrade-based daily Danas.

Speaking after he was elected, Bujosevic said that there would be "no programming, or any other changes" until the issue of the financing of the public service has been solved.

He told the Belgrade-based daily Blic that RTS next year change its model of financing and switch to receiving money from taxes, "which means losing some of the income."

Commenting on the news for B92, Vukasin Obradovic of the Independent Association of Journalists of Serbia (NUNS) said that RTS is "too influential to be allowed complete freedom."

"The editorial policy will be in line with the wishes of the authorities," he stressed.