In RTV, there are announcements of a possible termination of collaboration with a large number of freelance associates.

The main commissioner of the “Nezavisnost” union at RTV, Darko Šper, told the UNS website that in conversations with several editors of this media house, he learned that they received an oral notification about the upcoming termination of contracts with 100 freelance collaborators and several employees on fixed-term contracts, if necessary.

“No paper has been delivered to anyone, but the general director of RTV announced this to all chief and responsible editors during a program meeting organized three weeks ago. They were taken aback, knowing that they would have to create lists of colleagues with whom they would terminate cooperation. Many of those I spoke to said they would not do it at the cost of termination because they are aware that it would jeopardize the programming,” he said.

The general director of RTV, Goran Karadžić, however, stated to UNS that “this is absolutely not true and that these are arbitrary pieces of information that do not correspond to the truth.”

As he added, he has never speculated on numbers but only said that it is necessary to “rationalize the operations of a large company like RTV,” or that it is essential to assess “whether such a large number of employees is necessary or if it is possible to organize the work better.”

“We must reduce the large number of people and become more rational, and whether that will be five, 55, or 155 fewer people will be assessed through a business analysis. In no case will we be throwing around numbers arbitrarily. As a director, I requested assessments from each sector in the company regarding how we can rationalize our operations,” he said.

As the purpose of this decision, Karadžić cites “encouraging permanent employees to finally start doing their jobs.”

“Freelancers are said to be the most valuable and put in the most effort, but what are the permanent employees doing then?” Karadžić stated.

When asked by UNS why cooperation is being terminated with the most valuable employees, Karadžić replied that “permanent employees should be more valuable and not rely on colleagues who are there temporarily.”

He added that “freelance contracts exist to be concluded and terminated, and do not guarantee collaborators that they will stay somewhere for 40 years.”

“These are temporary jobs, the very word says it,” he added.

While Darko Šper notes that some freelance collaborators at RTV have been “temporary” for more than 10 years, Karadžić states that there are no more such cases.

“There may be people who have been freelance collaborators for several years, but those who have been there for more than 10 years have since been employed permanently,” Karadžić noted.

Šper: The new Law on Public Media Services is the reason for the rationalization of operations

As the reason for terminating cooperation with freelance collaborators, Šper cites the amendments to the Law on Public Media Services.

According to the new Law, as of January 1, public services will lose budget funding. This funding, as Šper noted, amounts to 900 million dinars annually, or 75 million monthly.

“With a subscription fee of 349 dinars, we cannot function. Without a minimum subscription of 500 dinars, we simply cannot operate, unlike RTS, which has more stable funding.”

Karadžić, on the other hand, states that this “rationalization of operations” has nothing to do with the new Law, but exclusively “with the need for the company to be better organized and efficient.”

Why didn’t the social program yield the expected results?

Due to the need for rationalization, 102 journalists, editors, and media workers left Radio-Television Vojvodina (RTV) in December last year, accepting the social program.

The social program was, according to previous reports by UNS, implemented in collaboration with the Ministry of Finance, which provided 350 million dinars for it.

Technological progress and the new RTV building, as Karadžić stated at that time, require new standards regarding the number of employees and the most rational approach to personnel changes.

He now says that the social program yielded results, but that different sectors subsequently made new hires for those positions.

“At that time, we reached a situation where we had the same number of people as before, which is neither realistic nor possible,” he noted.

Why does having fewer employees mean a decrease in program quality?

Currently, RTV has, according to Darko Šper, 950 employees on indefinite contracts, who cannot be relaxed without cooperation with the unions, but also nearly 150 employees on fixed-term contracts and at least 100 freelancers.

“Thus, there are 250 at-risk individuals, or those with whom cooperation may be terminated. If the director starts making cuts, he can easily eliminate those 150 to 200 people to achieve profitable operations. However, the question arises – what is the purpose of having a provincial public service without those people? What will we broadcast and for whose money?” he added.

Šper noted that with the departure of people, especially those from minority editorial teams, the existing programming scheme “falls apart.”

By the way, the second program of the television has editorial teams in Hungarian, Romanian, Slovak, Rusyn, Roma, and Croatian languages. In those editorial teams, as Šper stated, about 10 people work, so the departure of each of them can have repercussions on the quality of the program.

Šper: The first meeting after the roof collapse was held three weeks ago

It is indicative, adds Darko Šper, that this was the first meeting held after November 1.

“Since November, the program has been in a very problematic state. This meeting was clearly organized precisely because of this situation,” he added.

Regarding this meeting, according to the “Nezavisnost” union, no official information was sent from RTV management. The general director, as Šper added, was not obligated to inform them about it.

However, he stated that it would have been courteous to do so, as there could be serious changes in the editorial team. Concerned about the position of people at RTV, the “Nezavisnost” union, as Šper added, contacted the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ). UNS also informed the European Federation of Journalists about this announcement of the termination of collaboration.

Source: UNS