Information

The new Unified Information System (UIS) of the Ministry of Information and Telecommunications, through which media projects have been evaluated this year for project co-financing competitions, has caused a number of difficulties, agree most members of this year's project evaluation committees contacted by ANEM. Additionally, many of them highlight as a significant problem that certain candidates were members of a large number of committees, and they believe that this should be limited.

While waiting for the official confirmation regarding the outcome of the repeated privatization of Radio-Television Kragujevac, the city authorities, in silence and without explanation, are reducing the amount of funds for public information as planned in the budget for 2025. This comes just a few weeks after they approved an increase in subsidies for RTK. Instead of the 47.5 million dinars that were supposed to be allocated to the media through a public competition, only nearly four times less money—12.6 million dinars—has been designated for this purpose, while just over 11.4 million dinars remain unallocated.

The Ministry of Information and Telecommunications has not yet responded to the request from journalistic and media associations for changes to the process of project co-financing of media content. Based on the application form for registration in the register for members of the new commissions, it is evident that none of the proposals regarding the scoring of candidates has been accepted.

The Ministry of Information and Telecommunications, based on Article 32 of the Law on Public Information and Media and Article 20 of the Regulation on Co-financing Projects in the Field of Public Information, has invited journalistic and media associations, theorists, analysts, and practitioners in the media field to apply for enrollment in the Register of Candidates for Commission Members via the Unified Information System (UIS).

The highest amount of funding in this year's competition for project co-financing of media content in Novi Sad was awarded to TV Kanal 9 and Poljoprivrednik, each receiving 1.5 million dinars, according to the resolution on the allocation of funds published today.

The selection of members for the committees assessing media projects is one of the most important segments of the project co-financing process. The legal selection of the expert committee is of utmost importance to ensure that the project evaluation process, and consequently the allocation of funds, proceeds in accordance with the law and the legally defined measures and criteria.

More than 27 million dinars of public funds have ended up this year in the accounts of media outlets owned by Vladan Stefanović through 16 supported projects. The Ministry of Information and Telecommunications alone contributed 17 million, while the remainder was provided by the Province and the local governments of Subotica and Novi Bečej.

The process of project co-financing for media content in Novi Pazar is non-transparent, influenced by politics, and unfair, as every year more than 70 percent of the funds are allocated to a single media outlet – Radio-Television Novi Pazar, according to representatives of local media from that city.

In the competition for project co-financing of media content in Novi Pazar, more than 75 percent of the financial resources were allocated to Radio-Television Novi Pazar this year, amounting to 30.8 million dinars out of a total of 41 million dinars. The remaining 10 million dinars were distributed among 22 media projects. According to the competition rules, a maximum of 32 million dinars could be awarded to a single project.