30. 11. 2005

JOURNALISTS WALKED OUT OF PRESS CONFERENCE

GORNJI MILANOVAC, November 30, 2005 – Belgrade media correspondents and journalists from local media walked out of the press conference yesterday organized by the local Serbian Renewal Movement (SPO) committee in Gornji Milanovac, as an act of protest against the series of insults issued to them by the members of the local government and councilors of that political party. The reasons for insults to journalists was the reporting of the Belgrade daily Vecernje novosti, which wrote that the new councilors’ majority in the Municipal Council had appointed president of the SPO local committee Bozidar Vucetic as acting director of the local television station, which was not in line with the Broadcast Act, since the president of a political party could not also lead a public media company. Councilor Ljubinko Draskovic said that Vucetic had resigned his position in the party on October 14, on the day of his appointment as acting director, and called the journalists “liars who work under command”. The journalists denied this saying that, only three days ago, Vucetic told them that he was not aware of the certain article in the Broadcast Act. The insults did not stop, so the journalists decided to walk out of the press conference. President of the Gornji Milanovac journalists’ activist group Petar Jeremic notified the Association of Serbian Journalists of the incident, demanding their urgent reaction in order to stop insults and dishonoring of journalists coming from the members of the political party, which delivered the information minister. Jeremic also said that the appointment of Vucetic was “a classical case of law flouting”, which the journalists reported.