Public Broadcasters and Balkan Ghosts

Michael Hedges October 1, 2004

If counting stations best measured a regions broadcasting health, radio in the western Balkans would be called strong and thriving. It is not.
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Public broadcasters, in particular, are suffering, mostly from neglect. Transitions from state to public service broadcasting stall as political forces drag their feet.

The western Balkans   - Serbia / Montenegro, Bosnia / Herzegovina, Croatia and Macedonia and Albania - are a contentious and struggling group of countries once held together by strong-men and dictators. Bringing order has fallen largely to international organizations mandated to bring stability to the region.

The most economically independent country in the region, Slovenia declared independence from Yugoslavia in 1991 and joined the EU in May of this year. Radio – Televizija Slovenija (RTV-SLO) has also been the most successful in making the transition to public service broadcasting. “The situation of Radio Slovenia,“ said radio director Miha Lampreht in the RTV-SLO 2003 annual report, “was not bad.”

The European Commission (EC), the Council of Europe (CoE) and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) exert pressure – sometimes subtle and sometimes not – on governments to conform to western European media policy standards. Closer ties with the European Union (EU) and the promise of eventual EU membership are strong incentives. Some governments favor political control over national broadcasters, creating an impasse.

Erhard Busek, special coordinator for OSCE, said at a regional meeting of government heads in July, “the priority of EU enlargement is southeastern Europe, there is no other direction.”

CoE media coordinator Ivan Nikoltchev reasons that countries desiring a fast track to EU membership are more likely to take the transition from state to public service broadcasting seriously. Croatia and Macedonia are making the most progress, he said, while efforts in Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia continue to be mired in local politics.

State media in the former Yugoslavia, Yugoslav Radio – Television, was loosely constructed but tightly controlled. Ethnic regions, now forming distinct countries, had linguistically separate broadcast services with tight political control from Belgrade.  When Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia / Herzegovina and Macedonia declared independence between 1991 and 1992 separate state broadcasters took over frequencies and facilities. Serbia and Montenegro, combined with Kosovo, are provinces of the same state and maintain separate state-run broadcasters. Every aspect of life in Kosovo, including broadcasting, is now controlled and managed by international organizations.

From the outside looking in, these state broadcasters trumpeted fiercely nationalistic lines and, equally fiercely, denied any possibility of dissent.  From the inside they were political instruments crumbling under the weight of 1950’s technology and thinking.

European institutions set two basic priorities for media – radio, TV and print – as they exerted their influence in the western Balkans. First, privately-owned media was encouraged by eliminating state monopolies. The effect, it was thought, would be independent voices in the media landscape. Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and foundations were recruited to launch radio and television stations based on western European standards. One of the most successful and well publicized is B92 in Belgrade, originally financed in part by George Soros Open Society and Media Development Loan Fund (MDLF).

Most licenses, and hundreds of them, were handed out to the politically well-connected. Between 1991 and 2003 the number of stations in Bosnia-Herzegovina increased from 54 to 141, the majority to private owners. When the Macedonia Law on Broadcasting was adopted in 1997, 80 new private radio concessions were allocated. By 2003 the number dropped to 67. Between 2002 and 2003 the number of radio stations in Serbia jumped from about 600 to more than 800.

The second priority sought to re-cast state broadcasting in western European public service standards.  Western experts arrived with studies, reports and new models. The current broadcast law in Bosnia / Herzegovina is derived from a German model. Slovenia’s media law is similar to Italian laws.

The transition from state to public service broadcasting has been difficult. Even in Western Europe, the transformation is not uniformly complete. Eastern European state institutions, including broadcasting, continue to reel under pressures both from within and from outside their borders. Changing political faces seems easy compared to getting the trains to run on schedule. State broadcasters have largely been left to flounder with little financial support and aging structures.

Croatia’s HRT (Hrvatska Radio-Television) has made the most progress in forging the independence necessary to function as a public service broadcaster. It has not come easily. Media laws have been passed and revised several time, each time stepping closer under pressure from European institutions.

Forming Serbia’s Broadcasting Council has been on hold for two years, which would administer the state broadcaster, Radio TV Serbia (RTS), and license private stations. At July’s end, the Serb parliament was set to amend the Broadcasting Law to strengthen government control.  International experts recommended 30% to 50% staff cuts at Montenegro’s Radio-Television Crna Gora (RTCG) to “stream-line” operations. The sole public radio channel, Radio CG, competes with dozens of commercial stations for the tiny ad revenues available.

BH Radio 1, a new public service channel covering Bosnia-Herzegovnia, was launched in 2001, using the slogan “One for all (Jedan za sve).” The station targets a broad audience and, according to Prism Research, is the most listened to station in the country.

“The processes of transition into new, modern professional standards and technologies are still in progress,” says station spokesperson Vesna Andree Zaimovic. License fees and advertising support the programming and a full time staff of 67. Ads are limited to 6 minutes per hour.

Radio BiH became Federal Radio, broadcasting to the Serbian sector.

Macedonia’s state broadcaster – Makedonska Radiotelevizija (MRT) – operates three national channels and 29 local radio stations. Founded in 1991, MRT joined the EBU in 1993. Gordana Stosic, former executive with Sky net TV, was appointed General -Director in 2002 and has attempted to move toward greater independence.

Speaking to a CoE Parliamentary Assembly on public service broadcasting in January, Mrs. Stosic “regretted” that politicians in Macedonia, like other countries in the region, viewed “public broadcasting as state broadcasting,” serving institutions rather than citizens.

At the same meeting, Dr. Karol Kakubowicz, advisor to the Polish National Broadcasting Council, Radio TV Commission, argued that legal frameworks are not enough; state sector management and financing create conflicts. State broadcasting risks becoming a “parliamentary broadcasting service,” he said, because of close relationships with politicians.

Street-cars in Pristina, capitol of Kosovo, give the city a borrowed appearance. They were donated from all over Europe - Frankfort, Germany, Sion, Switzerland, and other places – keeping the same markings as if no Kosovar system exists. It is the same with broadcasting. Functionally run under UN, NATO and EU mandates, though officially a province of Serbia/Montenegro, Kosovo is a patchwork of aid agencies and international organizations. Broadcasting is much the same.

OSCE established a Temporary Media Commission (TMC) in 2000 to oversee all broadcast licenses. Three license categories are based on geography and public interest; Kosovo-wide, municipality and low-power stations in areas not otherwise served by municipal stations. Fifty-four stations have been licensed. The current commissioner is Robert Gillette, an American who helped establish the media regulator in Bosnia – Herzegovnia.

Both public and private media in Kosovo receive donor support and sell advertising. The result, according to a USAID media assessment published in March, leaves “the media market distorted and blurring distinction between public and private.

Kosovo Radio and Television (RTK) is supervised by OSCE and managed by the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) since 1999, modeled as a western European public service broadcaster. Radio Blue Sky, originally built by Fondation Hirondelle and financed by the Swiss government, was merged into RTK in 2000 as a second channel. When its mandate was renewed in 2003, the EBU pushed forward compulsory license fees to finance RTK independently from state budgets.

The United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMiK) and TMC Commissioner Gillette condemned sensational media coverage of the March drowning deaths of three children, after which riots against ethnic Serbs caused more deaths. A UN investigation found the drownings accidental and pointed to RTK broadcasts as flaming the violence. Gillette ordered UN security police to seize tapes from radio and television stations, creating anxiety among journalists about press freedom.

This article previously appeared in Radio World International, October 1, 2004, in a slightly different form.

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