Debate on the independence and role of REM and the Press Council

(Source: ebraničevo) The first debate of a total of four on the topic “Independence and the role of regulators” was held today, within the project “The future is in free local media”.

The panelists were Zoran Sekulic, director and editor of FoNet, Tamara Skrozza, journalist of FoNet and member of the Complaints Commission of the Press Council and Olivera Milošević, vice-president of the UNS and member of the Press Council Complaints Commission, and the debate was attended by journalists from Požarevac. In accordance with the topic, the panelists spoke about the role and work of the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Media (REM) and the Press Council.

“When it comes to media regulation, I am without a shred of illusions. I participated in the development of the first media strategy in 2011 on behalf of the entire media community, and then we had hopes that changing the legal framework would improve something in the media sphere, and in the end we got a practice of complete political abuse. Today, this system of misuse and use of media is, in my opinion, brought almost to perfection. The ultimate consequence of the whole thing is that the citizens of Serbia are not timely, complete or comprehensively informed about what is happening because they are permanently faced with the production of illusions,” Sekulic believes, adding that they are rare media that try to seize themselves and adhere to the elementary standards of the profession and codes on the margins.

She pointed out that the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Media is completely dependent on the authorities.

“Whatever the government was, REM was under its influence, whether it was assigning frequencies or sanctioning the media. Since 2003, REM has been a branch of government and regulatory dependent body. They have high powers and competencies that they do not use in the right way,” Skrozza pointed out.

She added that the idea is to protect the media that illegally and unethically report, and the criticism is exposed to professional media, i.e. those perceived as oppositional. He estimates that the role of REM is completely meaningless.

Milosevic believes that REM is captured, and therefore the media scene, and that it is difficult to imagine today how it is possible to get out of this captivity in a situation when in Serbia we have captured an entire system of institutions that are not necessarily tied to the media but are part of society.

“REM is conceived in the image of some other regulators, however, we as a society and as a media community are inclined to turn everything into the opposite of what was conceived. This is the case with REM, which is not only politicized, but practically exists to protect and reward media with a long history of violating all professional standards, media that have misled the public for many years, who spread hate speech and disinformation. The bottom line is how much power the media community has to change something, I don’t think it’s enough,” Milosevic said.

According to her, as far as the press council is concerned, the situation is different. There were tendencies, he says, to include representatives of unrepresentative associations in the council, but that did not happen, but these pressures still exist. There have even been stories about the establishment of parallel Press Councils so that, Milosevic believes, this struggle will continue in the future.

“Many journalists at the local level, especially the public, do not have enough information about the work of the Press Council, and I think that in the coming period we should work on presenting to the public the work of the council, what possibilities exist and what they are reflected in. The data from the last monitoring is that out of 41 complaints, a good part comes from local societies, i.e. people complain about the violation of the code in the local media,” Milosevic said.

Skrozza, who has been on the Press Council since its inception, says it has been made for years and reminds that it started working in September 2011 and has been functioning non-stop ever since. It deals with the implementation and compliance with the Code of Journalists of Serbia and decides on the complaints of people and media who feel hurt.

“The Press Council is a self-regulatory body and unlike REM, it is not elected by the assembly and the only body that managed to create mutually feuding journalist associations and around which the journalistic community has gathered. It is the only media organization that has positive assessments in all previous reports of the European Commission on Serbia’s progress in the European integration process,” Skrozza emphasized.

There are, Skrozza notes, two currents — a political one, which complains about the media for justified or unjustified reasons, and another that implies that the media is suing each other.

“At the moment, this is happening because it has been announced that the media that have been sanctioned several times before the Press Council will have lower budget allocations. The Press Council advocated that the media recognize and respect his jurisdiction, not that red cards be counted,” Skrozza explained.

The panelists are not particularly optimistic that something will change for the better in the future, but they expressed hope that younger generations will continue to fight as they do now.

Author: A. Grujić