PODGORICA, 02.09.2016. -The European and International Federations of Journalists (EFJ/IFJ), the Trade Union of Media of Montenegro (SMCG) is a full member of, have sent a letter to Montenegrin officials urging them to provide a fair trial to freelance journalist Jovo Martinovic, who has been in custody since October 2015, and to allow him to be on pre-trial release.

The letter was delivered to President of Montenegro Filip Vujanovic, Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic, the Ombudsman Sucko Bakovic, Minister of Justice Zoran Pazin, the Supreme State Prosecutor Ivica Stankovic, the Chief Special Prosecutor Milivoje Katnic, President of the High Court Boris Savic, High Court judge Dragoje Jovic, Head of Mission of EU delegation in Montenegro Aivo Orav and High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini.

In the letter signed by the IFJ president Philippe Leruth and EFJ president Mogens Blicher it is stated that they are writing to the officials “with continued grave concerns over the court proceedings against internationally highly respected freelance Montenegrin journalist  Jovo Martinovic”.

“He was charged with membership of a criminal organisation and with drugs trafficking. Jovo Martinovic had been detained on suspicion of participating in a drug trafficking ring since October 22, 2015. We are shocked by the gravity of his possible sentence being more than 10 years in prison. The EFJ and IFJ urge the Montenegrin authorities to consider his journalistic work as a possible   explanation   for   his   alleged   contacts   with   drug   traffickers   while   many   other testimonies in his support have come from prominent journalists all over the world”, the letter said.

They added that Martinovic insisted he was not guilty, saying that his contacts with the other suspects were purely linked to his work as a journalist.

“His interactions with two of the other 17 suspects in the alleged drug-trafficking were part of his journalistic work. We urge you to submit as soon as possible the case files and allow Jovo Martinovic to defend himself. We demand that Jovo Martinovic be out on pre-trial release and that custody is not converted into imprisonment even before the trial has even started”.

The letter stated that in line with International standards of the Council of Europe, the courts had to take account of Martinovic’s status as a journalist. “The criminalisation of journalists who specialise in sensitive subjects poses an imminent threat to press freedom”, the letter said.

“We also wish to remind you that the Montenegrin government is required to respond to the alert about the Martinovic case that has been registered on the Council of Europe’s platform for the protection of journalism back on 13 April, see “Freelance journalist and fixer Jovo Martinovic in custody since October 2015.” He is known for his work on investigative stories, and has contributed reporting and research to many international news media outlets, such as The Economist, Newsday, Global Post, The Financial Times, Die Süddeutsche Zeitung, and VICE media group.

Thank you very much for paying attention to this letter. We also wish to refer to reactions by other press freedom organisations such as the Committee to Protect Journalists, see letter from April 19 of this year, and by Reporters without Borders and BIRN”, it was said at the end of the letter.

SKOPJE, 02.09.2016 Association of Journalists of Macedonia strongly condemns the verbal threats of Ecology Minister Bashkim Ahmeti yesterday by mobile phone against the journalist and the owner of the web portal
Tetovo Sot, Rami Mislimi.

Threats and humiliation of journalists by senior power officials have no place in civilized and democratic countries!

Any threat to a journalist is an attack on freedom of expression, media freedom and the public’s right to be informed.

Only childish personalities who by accident became ministers can afford in this inappropriate way to address a journalist. Bashing a journalist than hiding behind immunity is an act of cowardice and primitivism.

We ask Prime Minister Emil Dimitriev and DUI leader Ali Ahmeti to publicly condemn this unacceptable behavior of Minister Ahmeti!

Skopje, 02.09.2016

Association of Journalists of Macedonia

SKOPJE 29.07.2016 The Association of Journalists of Macedonia has joined the International Federation of Journalists and initiative in support against the wave of attacks targeting journalists and media outlets in Turkey.

Today, AJM send a letter of concern to the Turkish Ambassador, H.E. Ömür Şölendil, in which they condemn the mass arrests of journalist and closure of media outlets, that occurred after the coup d’etat attempt. In the letter, the president of AJM, Naser Selmani, called on the Turkish government to refrain from further attacks on journalists and media. “We believe that the state of emergency should not be used as an excuse for widespread purges in media and other sections of society. Censorship of media simply for criticizing government policy is unlawful, even in a state of emergency.” was written in the letter by Selmani.

AJM and all of the members of IFJ and EFJ, call on the Turkish authorities to respect international conventions protecting the human rights, the trade union rights and the freedom of expression.

On this page you can follow up with the current number of imprisoned journalists and media owners in Turkey, reported by EFJ.
In the name of freedom and democracy in Tourkey, we eager to you sing a petition published by Amnesty International

PODGORICA, 12.06.2016. – The draft decision on establishing an interim committee for supervising investigations on jeopardising safety of journalists and media outlets, which would deal with the “analysis of the autonomy degree in the work of journalists and their independence, including media owners” – precisely represents an attack on our professional autonomy.

If a committee with these powers was formed, we fear that it would only further jeopardise media freedom in Montenegro because it is inconceivable in a democracy that politicians are engaged in controlling journalists’ work. The situation in the developed world is reversed – journalists are the ones whose principal job is to control the work of politicians, who are paid by all taxpayers, whereas politicians do not deal with how autonomous each journalist is. After all, it is also unclear how such a thing can be determined. And since we often refer to the rules of the democratic states, we would like this initiative proponents to tell us whether there is a parliamentary or any other competent authority with such powers elsewhere.

We agree that it is necessary to ensure the autonomy of journalists in the sense that the owners and editors must not publish an article or a video with the journalist’s signature, if their content is substantially modified or if it opposes the journalist’s moral principles. In this case, the article or the video report can only be released without the journalist’s signature. We also agree that journalist should be free to work and deal with topics of social importance in a professional, objective and critical way…

Trade Union of Media of Montenegro (SMCG) will propose similar norms in the media branch collective agreement and we will insist that such activities of editorial staff are treated as a serious violation of work duties. This is a measure known in contemporary journalism. However, “analysis of journalists’ autonomy degree” would certainly represent a new, revolutionary (in the negative sense) achievement in this regard.

SMCG appreciates concern of the initiative proposer from the ruling parties who believe that the job security of journalists would be ensured in this way but it can be done much more efficiently by other means. MPs should insist more actively that the media owners obey the labour related laws. Also, the lawmakers should continuously analyse the possibility of improving these laws, in order to improve the gloomy financial situation of media employees, instead of making confusing laws such as the Law on Public Sector Salaries. This law is the reason why colleagues working in the RTCG public broadcaster and local public broadcasters do not know when they will receive their salaries and how much they will be paid.

Also, we cannot help feeling that this issue is used for a new political dispute. The committee establishing was proposed along with the initiative for setting up the new commission for monitoring the activities of the competent authorities in the investigation of old and recent cases of threats and violence against journalists. While it is good that several competent bodies are dealing with such a great problem in order to finally solve the cases of the attacks on journalists, the experience in Montenegro shows that establishing several bodies for the same thing often leads to reducing strength of the basic initiative and obstruction coming from one side. The experience of the previous commission confirms it.

Finally, SMCG says that our members are always ready to have their work checked and their respect for professional standards analysed. However, politicians cannot do that, but only independent regulators and citizens, who the media exist for and who the politicians should be accountable to.

SMCG Main Board.

PODGORICA, 23.01.2016. – During the past year, in most of the media outlets in Montenegro employees continued to work in conditions that are below the level at which their profession should be.

Low salaries, late payments, unpaid overtime, unreported employment (moonlighting) and generally poor treatment by employers have resulted in declining professional standards and working conditions. All this is further devastating if one bears in mind that Montenegrin journalism is celebrating 145 years since the first media outlet appeared in Montenegro – on 23 January 1871 the first issue of the Crnogorac newspaper was published in Cetinje.

Although the media industry appeared in Montenegro long before many other industries, it is on the top of the list by number of lost jobs. According to the Monstat statistics agency, nearly 600 jobs were lost on various grounds in the media outlets during the previous three years. The figure accounts for one third of the total number of employees in this industry.

A constant war the media outlets are waging against each other is still the most characteristic feature for the Montenegrin media. In that war, those who are perceived as pro-government and those who call themselves independent media are making efforts to air dirty laundry of each other in public, ignoring the professional standards. Too much fuss about their conflicts and hatred blurs the difficult situation in many media outlets when it comes to treating employees, meeting professional standards, as well as independence of journalists themselves. Additionally, there is political and economic pressure from various public and other power centres against the media. Therefore it is clear that the future of Montenegrin journalism does not provide many reasons for optimism.

Although the situation in many of the national media outlets is bad, conditions in a number of local media are causing particular concern. In most of the municipalities which are founders of the local radio and TV broadcasters there is absolute lack of concern for the media outlets (and employees working there) they are responsible for. Thus, for example, as many as 15 salaries are owed to Radio Ulcinj employees, 12 salaries to Radio Berane employees, whereas whopping 52 salaries were owed to the colleagues from Radio Cetinje until recently.

Other municipalities, pressed by penury caused by various reasons, started saving from the local media. Thus, the budget of RTV Budva for the current year has been reduced by €200,000, in order to settle previously accumulated debts for taxes and social welfare contributions. Also, last year, the local government allocated only €50,000 for digitisation process implementation, which was insufficient. That very sum was taken from the 2015 budget of RTV Budva. Furthermore, instead of employing people who have been working in RTV Budva without contracts for years, 23 part-time associates were laid off on 15 January, although production of a large part of the programme depends on them.

The reorganisation in Radio Herceg Novi is ongoing and the media outlet is facing administrative issues arising from dereliction of duties by the founders, ie the Municipality of Herceg Novi. We hope that the issues will be successfully resolved and we look forward to seeing the announced changes in the programme, which is to be more dynamic and richer in content suitable for local radio. All this will mean more work and probably better contact with the public, as well as fulfilling the basic purpose of local broadcasters.

The state in the smaller private-owned media outlets in Podgorica, as well as in the rest of Montenegro, is not much better. The Trade Union of Media of Montenegro has received complaints from colleagues who were laid off from the media outlets which they, in fact, were not employed in, since they never signed labour contracts.

Also, the expansion of the web portals in recent years has brought greater media pluralism, but also a new obligation to the authorities, which they did not meet as they should have. No one in the country cares about the portals even when it comes to basic registration, so they are completely out of the system. It is not known how many of these portals and websites in general there are and, in particular, how many people work for them. Almost all of those employees are unregistered and according to our information, their fees usually do not exceed €150 and they are often late.

For all these reasons, the Trade Union of Media of Montenegro calls on the state and local governments to be more involved in solving accumulated problems in the media, media owners to respect their employees’ labour rights and their autonomy, and the journalists and media workers to be a solidary group and fight for better position, which is a prerequisite for improving professional standards.

Main Board of the Trade Union of Media of Montenegro