The executive director of the Media Center, Goran Đurović, assessed that the program plans of Radio and Television of Montenegro (RTCG) for 2023 represent "a big step backwards".
The Media Center participated in the public discussion regarding the programming and production plans of RTCG for 2023 and submitted comments and suggestions to the Public Service, judging that one of the key shortcomings of the Programming and Production Plan is the form in which the draft document was prepared. According to the assessment of that NGO, the lack of information about the planned contents is striking.
"This plan is much worse than the previous ones in terms of the amount of information it offers, and we believe that this was done deliberately in order to leave a lot of room for manipulating certain (especially informative) content. The document does not specify the goals that certain radio programs want to achieve and television, the format of the shows (interviews, the participation of a large number of guests in the debate, etc.), nor their thematic content, is not known. This will inevitably lead to overlaps in the content covered, and in news shows, in accordance with the editor's personal preferences /author, it should be possible for topics to be covered in different formats," Đurović announced.
According to the Media Center, this approach opens up space for abuses that are "still visible in the news program" when, as Đurović said, it gives space to certain political actors to communicate their views on controversial topics without facing different opinions.
"This raises doubts about the editor's neutrality and points to personal political preferences. A precise description of the show's format, which must be consistently followed, should prevent the possibility of the management entering into trade with political actors and in some shows enable them to present their views through interview forms, although the show was originally planned as a debate forum," he points out.
Đurović believes that, when it comes to the Parliamentary channel, there is also a noticeable lack of information about content, goals, formats and potential participants, which "also opens up space for abuses of this channel, which were previously particularly visible in the way of monitoring the activities of the President of the Assembly ".
"This kind of approach is ideal for the continuation of the political trade of the management of RTCG with political parties that get space on this channel in accordance with the interests of the management, and not in accordance with the interests of the citizens. If the forms of the shows are not clarified, it will not be a surprise that everything less is reported or more important events in which the actor is the President of the Assembly, to read the announcements of the President of the Assembly (which we witnessed in the previous period), to simply make this channel a PR tool of a political party", emphasized Đurović.
He adds that, in this regard, it remains unclear why the activities of the presidents of the parliamentary committees are not monitored, because "they also represent the Parliament at certain events".
"In the draft of the Program and Production Plan, there is no clear aggregate data on how much of the own program is planned to be produced and how much is taken from other sources, so citizens will not know how many programs will be produced for the 17 million euros that they, through the budget, provide for RTCG This also creates space for avoiding responsibility for possibly small own production and conceals the fact that two-thirds of the RTCG budget actually goes to salaries and other expenses that are not related to the production of the program," the director of the Media Center pointed out.
He said that this NGO proposed that the central news program Dnevnik 2 should provide the public with more relevant information from local areas, address local problems of citizens and monitor the work of local self-governments. Đurović also emphasizes that life topics should take precedence over the protocol activities of the highest public officials.
"It is inappropriate for the Program and Production Plan to talk about technological progress and the expansion of the availability of RTCG, while at the same time, some municipalities are broadcasting articles in Dnevnik 2 once or twice a year. Instead of big words about launching new content, it would be better to the strengthening of the correspondent network and the training of a greater number of journalists to independently record and edit their reports from the field was announced, which is one of the essential assumptions for local topics and problems of citizens to be covered by the media," he states.
The media center suggested returning the program "NGO sector" to the programming-production plan for 2023, considering that this program can contribute to further reducing the prejudices of citizens in relation to non-governmental organizations.
The Media Center also announced that in 2023, only one show "Mechanism" is planned, which is prepared by the newsroom for investigative journalism. Therefore, they proposed to strengthen the personnel of that newsroom, which would prepare a series of broadcasts that would point out anomalies in the performance of public affairs and misuse of state resources.
"Specialized programs for people with disabilities, which talk about their problems and sensitize the public to their needs, are not planned, so the Media Center considers it necessary to return content for this vulnerable population to the programming scheme and also provide space for broadcasting service information that can to help parents of developmentally disabled children, whether it's news about treatment or other important information," Đurović points out.
The media center also believes that, within the framework of news broadcasts, it is necessary to continuously monitor the work of control, management or regulatory institutions, such as - the Agency for the Prevention of Corruption, the Regulatory Agency for Energy, the Agency for Electronic Media...
Đurović also points out that there is no planned broadcast of the traditional children's music festivals "Naša radost" and "Zlatna pahulja" in the program plan of TVCG. "The removal of festivals with so much tradition (37 and 29 years of tradition) from the program scheme indicates a worrying attitude of the management towards cultural heritage. The media center therefore proposes that children's music festivals be returned to the program production plan for 2023," he adds.
"The programming and production plan of TVCG envisages a single cultural documentary show and 36 'Art magazine' shows. It is necessary to significantly increase the volume of cultural content because it is incomprehensible that only 18 hours of programs are planned for the whole year," Đurović emphasizes.
The media center also suggested that the production of entertainment content for the New Year holidays should be included in the program plan.
"The program-planning document does not specify the types of content that will be provided through the purchase of independent production or through the joint production of content (co-production). The contents of independent production should complement the deficiencies in their own production, and not remain undefined in the program plan. In accordance with recognized shortcomings and goals of the national public media service, it is necessary to define priority content that will be provided through independent production," says Đurović.
The Media Center also believes that the national public broadcaster should provide space for topics dealing with religious and spiritual practices and teachings in a way that will be educational and that will promote the "humanistic values of those practices and teachings."
"Within special contents, it is possible to directly broadcast religious rites of all religious communities, but RTCG must not be influenced by religious communities and open up topics that are exclusively the sphere of interest of religious communities (e.g. questioning women's right to abortion)", concludes announcement.
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