When my young colleagues Sara and Jelena interviewed me for their video story around Media Freedom Day, their first question was - what do you first associate journalism with? To Sisyphus, I said. And why journalism as a profession, I answered - because of the passion for writing and because of the madness for justice and freedom.
The ancient Greeks had gods for all occasions and situations. Thus, the youngest son of Zeus, Kairos, was the god of the happy moment. They imagined him as a winged boy with a shaved head with only a single lock of hair above his forehead. He moved like a ghost around people, unnoticed, giving everyone one chance to recognize him. Only a few who were alert in spirit, determined and courageous, could catch that strand of Kairos and make a bow. Some call it success, perhaps it is more appropriate to say - mission.
25 years ago, several such individuals seized that moment and launched the first independent and first private newspaper in Montenegro. At that time, society functioned economically and value-wise as Milošević's province, and at the peak of that agony, an ulcer would burst, that is, the unique DPS, the monopolist and merciless master of Montenegro.
If the film goes back 25 years, it is impossible to imagine what CG would look like today if it hadn't been there News i Monitor. Without our contribution, there would hardly have been a historic departure in 1999 from Milosevic's war with the world. Or, who could guarantee that Đukanović would not have given up on the referendum in 2002, after Solana bent his arm, thus returning to factory settings and the Serbian world of the early 90s?! Without cringing News i Monitor it is difficult to imagine winning the referendum and reaching the high bar of 55 percent of votes for DA. Without News i Monitor a sovereign Montenegro would resemble Putin's Russia today. Without News the powerful voice of a couple of independent NGOs would be the inaudible chirping of a sparrow in the hustle and bustle of the city. Without our media, Marović would still be the sheik of the Budva emirate, Dragan Brković a strategic investor, Miomir Mugoša the eternal sheriff of Podgorica, Ivica Stanković would be spit on by Falcone, and Vesna Medenica the goddess of justice.
Over the past 25 years News tried to fulfill what they promised their readers on September 1, 1997 - to be independent but not neutral, to stick to reliable sources and verified information. Along with the motto of the editorial policy defined a long time ago by Mihailo Jovović, one of the chief editors - there is nothing personal! Which was the most challenging task because it was necessary to deal with the bad habits and mentality of Montenegrin citizens. In the land of serdars and dukes, where everything is made up or hidden, where everything is transferred to the personal, News have managed to defend themselves and save themselves from anyone's personal interest, including that of the founders and co-owners themselves.
When they are News started life in 1997. they predicted a lot of shortness of breath and travel. The longest until the next election, which was in 6 months. When the state was won by the referendum, one DPS minister told me - it would be best for us now News shut down. Our mission then turned into our calvary. Golgotha was possible because our executioners were our former comrades: poets, ethicists, journalists, painters, all from our ranks, Professor Miodrag Perović wrote in those years. But that too ended in August 2020. When the almighty DPS fell, so hard that it will never regain its previous form and strength.
If we had given up, it would have come true what every moron wants - that his meager thought be the generally accepted truth about reality that is repeated in chorus by "friends of the fatherland".
So we have reached our 25th birthday, we are getting used to a new, democratic reality, in which governments change almost like the seasons and in which the big fish finally start to end up where they belong. Mashala. To just support.
News i Monitor they continue to follow all these changes and support those processes that lead to the Europeanization of society, individual freedom, justice, the greatest rights for all our diverse minority groups and a sustainable economy of the ecological state. It is our (impossible) mission that we have not given up on and we will not give up.
And how the foundations have been laid on which the largest and most nautical media group of the region, and not only Montenegro, will be built, you will soon read in the unusual and authentic testimony of Professor Perović, who through the book Memories, with filigree precision, described the thorny path that was taken to establish independent media in Montenegro. The personal and general social drama of a time and a country is an exciting read that will be our best 25th birthday gift to all readers, for whom we exist.
Cheers!
The author is one of the founders News
Bonus video:
