14. 03. 2013

NIS OFFICIALS WANT NTV

Nis, March 14, 2013 (Radio City) - Third public discussion, held in Nis today, on the Draft Law on Public Information, envisaging, among other things, the end of direct financing of media from the state budget.

As this law directly affects the Niska TV, the loudest in the debate were the proponents of the NTV's being transformed into a regional public service broadcaster, although that was not the topic of the discussion.

The public debate on media gathered almost entire political elite in Nis. All local politicians strongly advocated for the NTV preserving the current status, despite the fact that the proposed law on public information stipulated the withdrawal of the state and local self-government from ownership in media.

The fact that so many public officials were present at this public debate speaks for their fear that, if the law was adopted in its existing text, they would lose their influence on media and the possibility of their self-promotion. Firm insisting on NTV earning the status of regional public service broadcaster only shows the level of competence of participants in the debate. Representatives of the OSCE Mission to Serbia and the Ministry of Culture as organizers of this event noted that regional public service broadcasters were not the subject of the Law on Public Information, but the Law on Electronic Media, which was yet to be publicly debated.