<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Peter Han\u00e1k is a journalist, researcher and university teacher. Since 2018, he has been working for Aktuality.sk, the most popular news website in Slovakia. He has been awarded the Slovak Journalism Prize twice, for the best podcast and the best news. Before joining Aktuality.sk, Peter worked as a reporter and presenter for the Slovak public broadcaster – then RTVS – where he witnessed its political capture<\/a>. He has also worked for economic daily and regional weekly newspapers. Peter holds a PhD in Media Studies from Charles University Prague, and an LL.M. in law and economics from Rotterdam, Hamburg and Haifa universities. In addition to his journalistic work, he serves as a lecturer at the Faculty of Law at Comenius University Bratislava and Bratislava International School of Liberal Arts (BISLA).<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Could you give us a brief overview of what has happened since the new public media act came into force in July?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Peter Han\u00e1k is a journalist, researcher and university teacher. Since 2018, he has been working for Aktuality.sk, the most popular news website in Slovakia. He has been awarded the Slovak Journalism Prize twice, for the best podcast and the best news. Before joining Aktuality.sk, Peter worked as a reporter and presenter for the Slovak public…Continue reading<\/span>Peter Han\u00e1k<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":1019,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1016","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-practitioners-corner"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iapmr.media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iapmr.media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iapmr.media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iapmr.media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iapmr.media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1016"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/iapmr.media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1018,"href":"https:\/\/iapmr.media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1016\/revisions\/1018"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iapmr.media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iapmr.media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iapmr.media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iapmr.media\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
RTVS as a public service broadcaster was dissolved and instead a new institution, STVR, was created.\u00a0This means that the relatively independent management of RTVS has lost its positions and a new interim director was appointed.\u00a0STVR bodies, especially the STVR Council that is supposed to elect the General Director, was not yet fully created.\u00a0The Council is now fully under the control of the governing coalition, as out of 9 members, 4 are nominated by the Ministry of Culture and the remaining 5 are nominated by the Parliament based on a simple majority, i.e. by the parties of the governing coalition. Currently (by November 2024), there is a disagreement between the coalition parties on the nominations for the STVR Council, which is why their election has been postponed several times.
Have there been any changes in the coverage and content of what is now formally STVR?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
The change can be seen in the nuances of what is not reported. For instance, when prime minister Robert Fico attacked journalists calling them \u201cbloodthirsty bastards\u201d, this was not reported in the main news of STVR.\u00a0There are personnel changes being reflected in the broadcasting. Among the first key people who had to leave STVR were the hosts of the main political debates \u2013 Mr. Marek Makara and Ms. Marta Jan\u010dk\u00e1rov\u00e1. The Slovak National Party (SNS), which is the member of the governing coalition responsible for the Ministry of Culture, has promised the party supporters that these two journalists will be removed from the main TV debate \u2013 and indeed this is what happened.\u00a0The new host of the main political debate on STVR has also not appeared on several editions of the programme for mysterious reasons, which indicates problems in the background.
Before the new law was passed, there was quite a lot of resistance from within the broadcaster as well. What is the situation now?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some of the people who organized the resistance have already left STVR, commenting that the new managers have harassed them. For example, the head of foreign news in the radio part of STVR, Ms. So\u0148a Weissov\u00e1, was removed from her position and left the institution.\u00a0Several others who represented resistance have left, were removed from their posts or were given less prestigious jobs. Instead, people who have a reputation for political capture of public service broadcasting in the past, have been selected for managerial positions, such as the head of the STVR news channel\u00a0:24<\/em>.
The Slovak opposition has filed a constitutional complaint against the new law. What is the current situation?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
The opposition filed a complaint demanding that the court would postpone the effectiveness of the law \u2013 the court did not do that and the law is in force. The court however accepted the complaint and will look into the conformity of the law with the Slovak constitution.The timeframe for the decision is not predictable, since it might take months or even years to reach a final decision. It is expected that STVR will have a new leadership and it will turn into the mouthpiece of the government meanwhile, and it would be interesting to observe what would happen if the court would decide to declare parts of the law unconstitutional. Since the public service media are not protected by the constitution directly, such a result is hard to predict.\u00a0
What support can international organizations provide in the current situation, and how do you expect the European Union to react, also in the light of the European Media Freedom Act?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n
International organizations can put pressure on the Slovak government to reduce the adverse effects of its policies. Such a pressure can only be efficient if it touches the interests of the current ruling coalition. In the light of their anti-EU and anti-western policies, it is a difficult task. However, the Slovak government is quite receptive if large sums are involved, such as the European funds. The government has already made some compromises with the European Commission (EC) on the controversial criminal act, and the text of the STVR law is also the result of such a compromise. However, the intention of the ruling coalition to completely capture public service broadcasting goes directly against the EMFA, and the EC should make it really clear that there will be more consequences than just the usual fines for non-compliance with European law.\u00a0This is the only real tool the EC has to efficiently incentivize the current Slovak government to behave according to Western democratic standards and not to copy the model of Viktor Orb\u00e1n, where\u00a0broadcasting is used as a propaganda channel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n