Podgorica, 25.03.2019. – The state and professional media organizations should invest more efforts in improving the status and freedom of journalists, the NGO Juventas stated and added that it is concerning that the majority of the citizens believe that Montenegrin media outlets are not free.
The Trade Union of Media of Montenegro (SMCG) believe that improvement of the public perception of media could be expected only if conditions would be created for the media outlets to function normally without pressures.
Juventas representative Mican Andrijasevic told Mina that it is necessary to increase transparency concerning financing of media, and he sees distancing from political and financial circles as one of the priorities.
According to Andrijasevic, the situation in media market and the general social atmosphere in Montenegro do not encourage the media and journalists to fight for freedom.
According to the survey carried out by CEMI, 39.3% of the respondents believe that Montenegrin media do not report freely and are under political and financial pressures.
Andrijasevic said that it is very concerning that the majority of the citizens believe that Montenegrin media are not free and thus it should make media owners, editors and journalists ask themselves how to regain the citizens’ trust.
SMCG president Marijana Camovic said that SMCG’s surveys prove that journalists are under huge pressure that leads to self-censorship.
“We have been persistently pointing out to that problem, and the European Commission and the Council of Europe’s experts reached the same conclusions and stated in their analyses that influence of media owners over the editors and journalist is concerning and must be changed”, Camovic told Mina.
Andrijasevic added that limiting media freedoms is dangerous for the citizens and their media literacy.
“The practice showed that many citizens are capable to assess if some media outlet is independent or not”, said Andrijasevic, adding that political influence is easier to be recognized since it is visible.
As he said, political influence is easier to recognize because it is more visible, while the economic ones are more difficult to detect, but with careful observation of marketing or covert advertising it is possible to draw some conclusions. Andrijašević believes that it is necessary to consider the economic impacts in relation to the political, because are often and simultaneously in parallel.
Camovic said that SMCG, as owners will not arbitrarily deprive themselves of the unlimited powers they now have, insists that this arbitrariness be limited in the Media Law whose amendments are currently in place.
“If we were, at least at the tertiary level, we managed to enable the editorial offices to function normally and without pressure, not to be the now rule for public interest to cease when economic or some other interests of media owners come to an end, only then could we expect to improve public perception when the media in question”, said Camovic. It would then be normal to expect someone to do so change because, as he adds, if the systemic problem does not resolve the situation, it can only be worse.
This article was published with the financial support of the US Embassy available within the project “Rereading – Rewriting. Improving media literacy in Montenegro”. The Mina agency assumes full responsibility for its contents, which do not necessarily reflect the position of the USA.