The mysterious association "Medijakult" from Novi Sad and how money is distributed in media competitions: "Mockery of the law"
In the interest of the public - funding should be allocated through media competitions. However, this is often not the case - the project of the Novi Sad cooperative Medijakult, which won the competition held by the Provincial Secretariat for Information and received nearly 5 million dinars, has reportedly been executed by other companies, according to findings by UNS. This is not in accordance with the law, but it seems that those who provided the funding do not see it. And it is not their money, but rather that of the taxpayers of Vojvodina.
Almost nothing is known about it. However, the Provincial Secretariat for Information seems undeterred by this. In the media competition, they selected the Novi Sad Cooperative "Medijakult" as the runner-up, which was awarded a cash prize for the implementation of its own project.
"The cooperative 'Medijakult' has paid out nearly five million dinars to other companies, entrepreneurs, and both physical and legal entities to carry out the project. This indicates that the cooperative lacks capacity or that its capacities are minimal, raising the question of why someone without the capacity to implement the project was given such a large sum of money," says Kristina Kovač Nastasić from the Association of Journalists of Serbia.
Moreover, the Law on Public Information does not permit other firms to carry out the winning project's work. From the Association of Journalists of Serbia, they state that this is not the only oversight in the referenced case. The scoring by the committee was also controversial, as it awarded higher points to the project in certain categories than allowed by the regulations.
"This is truly, despite all justifications, a classic circumvention of the law and a mockery of the law, but unfortunately neither the Ministry nor the province reacted," says Kovač Nastasić.
They are also not responding to our questions. The Provincial Secretariat for Information has not answered N1 about whether there were any oversights in the competition. Those who follow them say it is obvious how decisions are made.
"We have verified multiple types of abuse on the ground, and it has been decided that representatives of NDNV will not be in the committees so that there is no point in being outvoted by some GONGO organizations that pretend to be media or whatever, some of which were established just before the competition," says journalist Dalibor Strupar.
"We have a situation where only those close to the authorities receive money, and the crumbs from the table go to those who should actually receive funding based on the quality of their projects and the fact that they wish to promote or protect the public interest defined by law," says Saša Mirković from ANEM.
What is defined in the law for the transparent implementation of the competition remains only on paper, says ANEM representative Saša Mirković.
"Those provisions in the law, if applied literally, would not be in line with the interests of the ruling elite, which would thereby finance with public money those media and projects that are not aligned with this government," says Saša Mirković.
It is no secret that in media competitions, the largest portion of the "financial pie" is pocketed by tabloids, particularly those that have been violating the journalistic code for years.
Source: N1
