07. 05. 2005

BROADCAST COUNCIL STILL INCOMPLETE

BELGRADE, May 7, 2005 – The Serbian Parliament had elected, although with noticeable delay, eight members for the Broadcast Council in mid February, but the key body for regulating the media sphere still does not operate in full formation. The elected members of the Council have, timely and in line with the Broadcast Act, nominated the candidate for the ninth member from the Kosovo and Metohija region, but the election of the last member has not yet been included in the Parliament’s agenda. The deadline envisaged by the Act for the constitution of the Broadcast Council was November last year, however, the procedure is, the way things are, several months in delay. The Council nominated Tomislav Trific, MA and dean of the Arts Faculty at the University of Pristina, for the ninth member of the body. Upon the election of the last member, all nine members would vote one member for the president of the body. Until then, all important tasks and obligations entrusted by the legislator, such as the broadcast development strategy, broadcasting licenses, monitoring of broadcasters and so on, have been put on hold. Although the agenda of the Serbian Parliament cannot be swayed, member of the Council Vladimir Cvetkovic hopes that the ninth member of the body will be elected on one of the following parliamentary sessions, preferably by the end of the month. In the meantime, working versions of the material has been prepared, so the Council could start working once it is in full formation. The need to organize the chaotic media scene is more than obvious. At the debate on privatization of the print and electronic media, recently held in Kragujevac, Dragan Bosiljkic, project manager from the Agency for privatization, had announced the modifications of the Privatization of electronic media Bylaw, which should alleviate and hasten the process. According to him, there are currently around 1,400 radio and TV stations in Serbia, and not all of them would get the frequency in the process of frequency allocation.