PODGORICA, 18.11.2020. – The Council of the Agency for Electronic Media recently made a decision to release commercial and public broadcasters from paying the obligation of the fourth quarterly installment of the broadcasting fee for 2020. This reduced the regulator’s budget by 80,000 euros.
The agency helped the media in a similar way in March, when it exempted them from paying the second quarterly installment of the broadcasting fee for 2020, also in the amount of 80,000 euros.
“In August 2020, several broadcasters addressed the Council of the Agency and expressed their expectation or interest in the possibility of providing additional support or other measures not to jeopardize the continuity of their work in a situation caused by the spread of COVID-19 virus corona. The Council of the Agency continuously monitored the impact of implemented measures and the effects of possible future measures on the operations of these entities and the Agency in 2020. In doing so, it tried to reconcile the need for assistance, on the one hand, and the obligation of rational planning and spending. funds available to the Agency”, it was said from AEM.
Thus, at the session of the Council on November 17, a decision was made to provide this type of assistance to the media again.
Til June direct financial support of the Government of Montenegro to the Montenegrin media amounted to more than 310,000 euros, and an additional 300,000 euros is the value of obligations that the media were released or their payment was delayed, and they had the opportunity to defer tax and contributions for 90 days.
The government announced that subsidies for salaries were also provided to employees in the media, who were classified in the category of endangered activities. A credit line has been provided with the Investment and Development Fund for credit funds in the amount of up to EUR 600,000.
Support is committed to all print media (Pobjeda, Vijesti, Dan, Dnevne novine), commercial television broadcasters with national coverage (TV Vijesti, TV Prva, TV Nova M), portals with the highest number of visits (Vijesti, CdM, Analitika, FOS, Antena M) as well as for 14 local public broadcasters.
