The Slovak government is transforming the public media, the workers announced a day of mourning

On Wednesday, the Bratislava government approved the draft of the new public media law, which includes amendments to the election process for the leadership of the Slovak public media, as well as a name change.

“The situation in RTVS is untenable,” he declared on Wednesday Robert Fico after the government meeting. The Slovak Prime Minister is the head of government Martina Šimkovičová together with the Minister of Culture informed that the cabinet gave the nod to the termination of RTVS (the current cosmedia) and at the same time to the establishment of STVR, i.e. the new Slovak Television and Radio, writes the Slovakian Dennikn. According to Fico, their constituents demand from them to make changes in the RTVS, which “cannot be objectively objective” because, according to him, it is at war with the government.

One of the main attributes of the law on RTVS is that the adjective “Slovak” is returned to the name of the institution, explained the head of the Ministry of Culture.

According to MTI’s report, one of the substantive changes introduced by the proposed new law concerns the process of electing the head of the institution, specifically the composition of the nine-member public media council that elects the CEO. Until now, the members of the public media council have been elected by the parliament based on a special rotating rule. In the future, four of the members will be nominated by the Minister of Culture. With the entry into force of the new Public Media Act, the mandate of the current management of the Slovak public media will cease. The new law will also change the amount of commercials that can be aired on Slovak public television, increasing the maximum share of advertising time from the previously allowed 0.5 percent to 5 percent.

According to Fico’s hopes, the legislation will be adopted by the parliament in the summer.

The transformation is accompanied by heated debates. Branislav Gröhling, according to the president of the SaS, the Slovak public media will be transformed into a propaganda medium that spreads disinformation, which will spread pro-government and possibly pro-Russian propaganda. The politician did not rule out that his party would turn to the Constitutional Court regarding the draft law.

After the government’s decision, many of the employees of public radio and television replaced their profile photos on Facebook with a logo with a mourning frame, and announced that they would observe a day of mourning.