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30. 11. 2012

THIRTY-EIGHTH ANEM MONITORING REPORT

Report for October 2012 - Legal Monitoring of the Serbian Media Scene, in short:

Freedom of expression - in the part referring to threats and pressures, the authors analyze the following cases: 3 cases of serious intimidation of journalists by throwing explosive devices in the courtyard of their family home/apartment balcony - in neither case the perpetrators have been found, while in one of these cases, the intimidation has reached a disturbing point, where its context indicates that the intimidation may be aimed at covering up of the accountability of individual police officers for the attack on members of the family of a journalist, who had tried to point out on social networks negative phenomena in the society; the case of discrimination against a team of journalists who were denied access to a public joint session of four municipalities in northern Kosovo, for their critical reporting, rated as a "hunt" and "ordered campaign", on abuses of budget funds that were given to the Serbian community in Kosovo as assistance; case of attempted intimidation of journalists of two media by a local politician to disclose the source of the public information, available to all, which they published about him; in the part of the court proceedings, the authors analyze two cases - launching of proceedings before the European Court of Human Rights against Serbia by a private television station from Novi Sad, over the reluctance of the state to withdraw from ownership in media and violation of regulation on state aid control - the authors explain what conditions should be met so that a specific complaint to this Court would be acceptable; the other case refers to a long dispute between certain media and regulatory bodies for damages allegedly suffered by that media due to the allocation of frequency that has already been used by other broadcaster from a neighboring country.

Implementation of existing laws - the application of the Broadcasting Law is treated through a case that deals with the problem of financing of the public service from TV subscription fee and which the RBA has taken interest in, as well as through consideration of the issue of change of media ownership and the distinction between a change of ownership and resale of frequencies, or dispose of license, on the occasion of a daily newspaper dealing with this topic. Concerning the Statement of the Commissioner Sabic, that it was necessary to review the effects of the Law on Classified Data and its amendment or replacement with a new law, the authors analyze what effect this law has made in terms of the expectations of journalists and media.

The adoption of new laws - even in this period, no new laws relevant to the media have been adopted, however, the authors address the issue of implementation of the Media Strategy, on the occasion of the statements made by the Minister of Culture and the report of the European Commission on Serbia's progress.

According to the findings of the monitoring team, the results of the work of competent authorities in this period are: regulatory bodies - revoking of license of TV Avala, national broadcaster, for non-payment of broadcasting license fee, but also for considerably deviating from the program concept based on which it had been granted the license and failure to meet legal obligation of production of own programs and the news program; the number of radio and television stations that are looking at the seizure of license for unpaid license fees to regulatory body, has increased to 67 in just two months, which is 15% of the total number of licensed broadcasters; the number of illegal broadcasters has increased; three national stations have been ordered to specifically label the type of program, the recommended age and to broadcast certain programs after midnight; the Press Council, self-regulatory body - its Commission for Complaints brought three decisions, one of which was particularly significant because it argumentatively protected the right of media/journalists to express value judgments, as well as to comment and critically relate to topics they were treating; in this period, competent authorities and collective organizations have not significantly contributed to the progress of the media sector, which is evident in the part of the Report dealing with their work (the work of the Parliament's Culture and Information Committee, statement of the Minister of Culture and Media, the application of the Protocol signed between ANEM and Sokoj).

The process of digitalization - contains information about the most important events in this area - adopted Radio Frequency Allocation Plan and proposed granting of a state warranty for the loan to ETV aimed at purchasing the necessary equipment, which can be interpreted as the willingness of the government to truly carry out the process of digitalization.

The process of privatization - this part of the Report analyzes the case "Politika", namely the continuing practice of declarative opting for certain solutions, but applying quite the opposite ones in practice, especially when it comes to withdrawing of the state from ownership in media.

In the Conclusion of the Report, the authors are not offering an optimistic view of the media scene in Serbia, stating the reasons therefore.

The Thirty-eighth Monitoring Report done by the expert team of ANEM Legal Department, law office "Zivkovic&Samardzic", in cooperation with ANEM. You can download it here, in whole or in part, by clicking on the selected section below.