By: Peter Jančič (Spletni časopis)
With the appointment of Natalija Gorščak as the interim head of RTVS, the team of Igor Kadunc will today secure the only position they have not yet managed to take.
The RTVS Council will meet this afternoon to address the resignation of RTVS chairman Zvezdan Martić. Martić was initially appointed as the acting director of RTVS after a minority of constitutional judges last year overruled the majority, allowing purges even before a constitutionality review. This was done to quickly replace the television director Uroš Urbanija, as specified by the controversial law. Previously, the RTVS Council had similarly expedited the removal of former general director Andrej Grah Whatmough, who had joined RTVS as a representative of the SMC. The left-of-centre ruling parties in parliament had fraudulently appointed him as an RTVS supervisor, a position that legally should have gone to a representative of the opposition SDS. The court ruled at the first instance that the swift dismissal of general director Grah Whatmough, including the termination of his employment, was illegal. Martić, his successor, now had to resign after less than a year due to disagreements with the RTVS Council, which was appointed by the ruling parties.
The president of this council, Goran Forbici, has called a meeting of the RTVS Council for this afternoon to address the resignation and decide on the interim head of the management board. Attached to the meeting notice is Natalija Gorščak’s consent to take over this function. Gorščak was previously appointed as the director of television by then general director Igor Kadunc after the retirement of Ljerka Bizilj and the unsuccessful attempt with Katja Šeruga, who did not receive majority support from the council members. Kadunc, who leaned further left than Andrej Grah Whatmough from the liberal SMC, had selected Gorščak.
When Andrej Grah Whatmough succeeded Igor Kadunc after Kadunc’s term ended, having previously led the supervisory board for many years, he dismissed Natalija Gorščak as the director of Television Slovenia but did not terminate her employment. The court awarded her compensation in a dispute over irregularities in the dismissal process.
After the current ruling parties purged the top management of RTVS, Gorščak was already among the candidates for high positions. She was the only one who correctly applied for all the top positions immediately, specifically for the leadership of the multimedia centre (MMC) RTVS Slovenia. However, she was not ultimately selected. All candidates were given an additional week to correct their documentation due to numerous embarrassing application errors, as otherwise, they would not have formed a new leadership. The candidacy of Darja Groznik for the director of radio against the then-director Mirko Štular, who had been appointed by Kadunc, caused uproar. Štular had some difficulties because he was also part of the previous leadership under Andrej Grah Whatmough and did not publicly join the leftist journalistic activists’ protests calling for the dismissal of the entire leadership, including Štular.
In the end, Štular was re-elected. If Gorščak had been elected to the top of the MMC at that time, alongside Ksenija Horvat, who was chosen as the director of television, the largest media outlet in the country would have been entirely taken over by the former director Igor Kadunc’s team, rather than Zvezdan Martič and his four-member management board. Kadunc was quite critical of Groznik because she mentioned that she discussed her candidacy with the new head of management, Martič. Kadunc was not at all enthusiastic about Groznik, and she was not successful. However, it seems Gorščak will now achieve a much greater success and become the acting president of the management board following Martič’s resignation, allowing Kadunc’s team to completely take over the depoliticised RTVS under Svoboda, SD, and Levica.
Meanwhile, Kadunc has been quite critical of Prime Minister Robert Golob on Facebook, who expects more from RTVS than just demands for additional funding from the government.
After resigning as the director of the national press agency STA, Kadunc wrote about Golob:
“How severe is it when people at the highest positions think they know everything and are experts in everything? They make decisions with a mindset of ‘I have decided…’. It becomes very awkward when they can also perform excellently, as if they really know everything, and a lot of people believe them because of this. In this situation, journalists are practically powerless, viewed as some kind of annoying individuals who do not recognise their greatness.
I am almost certain that no one will analyse or criticise Dr Robert Golob’s appearance on Odmevi show regarding RTV. But the pirate in me says to do it myself.
First, where does he get the idea that RTV has ‘terrible bureaucratic procedures’? How can he say something like that when the truth is that RTV is largely digitalised, with relatively few levels, and even these exist due to journalistic profession rules. Programmes must have appropriately structured editorial offices. Editors are responsible for the published content! This is not so hard to understand!
It becomes much more awkward when we move to the financial domain. But let’s take it step by step.
It is true that with the change of law, politics has distanced itself from the leadership and management of RTV. Unfortunately, it did so with a flawed law, leading to problems. But I will not delve into that now. Golob is apparently dissembling when he says he is ‘saddened by the resignation’. Because he clearly states that he expects ‘the management to prepare a restructuring programme for the institute and a long-term and feasible financial plan for the next five-year period’. The very inability to prepare even a roughly suitable document was the reason some Council members withdrew their support. Better than what was diplomatically expressed by Minister Dr Asta Vrečko cannot be said. Namely, that the leadership did not prepare documents defining public service, evaluating it so that it would be known whether RTV needs 5 or 15 million euros. Golob is sad that the president of the management board, who for various reasons could not do what he himself demands from the president of the management board, has resigned. He obviously did not want to offend Martič’s supporters. But with this, he lost credibility and expressed a lack of confidence in the functioning of the RTV Council. I often point out the mistakes of the president of the Council, but I will always recognise his legitimacy myself!
It is extremely concerning that the Prime Minister does not know the facts about the financial situation of RTV. It is not true that paying €5 million for nationality programmes was a ‘solution for last year’. Not at all, as RTV still had a loss of €6,985,988 despite this ‘solution’. This certainly did not fulfil the constitutional and legal obligation to ‘ensure adequate funding’. Whether the additional €10 million for 2023 will suffice for positive operations remains to be seen. The fact is, many programmes have been cut, and many have been impoverished due to insufficient revenue. In my opinion, this kind of cost-cutting at the expense of the reputation of the only public RTV is unacceptable. But if such an impoverished programme (including the elimination of three foreign correspondent positions!) and general dissatisfaction among programme creators is acceptable to Golob, then let’s say they have ‘solved’ 2024. This is assuming that increased revenue or further cuts will cover the €2 million in increased salary costs, which were not covered in the Financial Plan.
The problem arises when the Prime Minister states that he will meet with the new President of the Management Board only after they prepare a ‘restructuring programme for the institute and a financial plan for the next five-year period’. First, why would RTV need a restructuring programme? Yes, I know that some Council members talk about ‘programmatic, personnel, and financial reorganisations’. I keep saying that RTV needs a rehabilitation programme, which will include necessary changes in organisation and programme preparation. However, the savings from this will be relatively small. Also, because cost-cutting is not uniform, as nationality programmes, especially in Koper, have a special status. Like the Council, the Prime Minister does not explain what they mean by these modern managerial clichés. The fact is, RTV Slovenia has become much more rationalised since 2012. The number of employees and permanent associates has decreased from over 2,500 to just over 2,000! Revenues have decreased not only by the frequently mentioned €30 million due to the lack of an increase in the RTV fee, but back then they had to sell shares, which brought in €6 million in revenue. Only with this did they avoid a loss in 2012! Of course, this affected the programme, especially drama. The increased costs for rights, such as for the Olympic Games or the football championship, need not be mentioned. Nor should it be mentioned that RTV cannot achieve as much revenue in today’s media (advertising) market as it did 20 years ago.
But apparently, the Prime Minister is not aware of these indisputable facts! I know that the Ministry of Culture is aware of them. Also, because they are very likely reading my analyses. I ask the Prime Minister, which public institution manages to operate with realistically 35% lower revenues? Please, tell us! And consider how much RTV has done to follow trends in the AV field. That you can find it everywhere on all devices and channels, that it has done a lot to increase accessibility! And then you hear demands for ‘restructuring’. RTV leadership has generally done a good job in the financial sector. Does the Prime Minister know the crucial fact for the distribution of public funds that RTV’s revenues measured as a percentage of GDP were 0.363% in year zero, but only 0.222% in 2023! Is an organisation that has continuously ensured an appropriate level of ‘production’ (programmes, shows, concerts, etc.) really in need of reorganisation before it is provided with at least minimal coverage for the loss of real revenue caused by inflation and the absence of special funding sources (from the sale of shares)?
How catastrophic was Golob’s statement that providing additional money for RTV would be ‘throwing money into a bag where you do not know what happens with it, it never solves any problem’. RTV knows extremely well where every euro they receive is spent. And since 2016, it has been known that they have too little for regular operations. So additional money for RTV is by no means throwing money into a bottomless pit. If revenue measured as a percentage of GDP decreases by 39%, it is very clear that significant cost-saving measures have already been implemented. Therefore, his next assertion that ‘it is necessary to get responsible leadership, to prepare a feasible plan, and then together we will find stable financing for such a plan’ is empty talk without substance. Of course, it would be very good if the RTV Council could provide appropriate leadership, which it failed to do the first time, but this is a necessary, absolutely not a sufficient condition. Also, because the Council selects who it selects. It will apparently be put to a big test on Monday when it is expected to appoint Natalija Gorščak as the acting director.
How can the new president of the board (not sure if he meant acting president too) prepare, yes you heard correctly, ‘a restructuring programme for the institution and preparation for the next five-year period’ without the cooperation of the founder, who should (together with the leadership) agree on the scope of the public service, how RTV should carry it out. Then, the RTV board will surely not find it difficult to calculate what ‘adequate funding’ should be for the next year or two. Without proper indexation of guaranteed revenues, this simply cannot be done for five years! Especially in a field where things are drastically changing. Therefore, I responsibly claim that the new board will be able to prepare a decent recovery programme only with an agreed scope of ‘appropriate funding’ for a much more precisely defined public service, as derived from the law, coordinated with the government (politics). Only when this is done will the Council be able to correctly perform its task. That is, to ‘force’ the board to do the right things in the right way. This also includes the important point emphasised by the Council President in the interview on the First, that board members tell the Council members what is relevant and feasible and what is not. This has not really happened so far. Because of this, they often ‘clashed’.
As for the increase in the RTV contribution as soon as possible and/or the immediate change of the law and the transition to a fairer ‘Scandinavian’ funding system, ‘Minister Golob said nothing’!
I hope now everyone also understands the body language and the lack of a clear answer regarding the increase of the RTV contribution from Minister Dr Asta Vrečko the day before on Odmevi show! It is extremely sad that history repeats itself as a farce here as well. When we started activities in 2019 to increase the RTV contribution by 1 euro (i.e., less than 10%), we encountered words about a ‘Greek scenario’ from both Ministers of Culture, but we quickly came to the point that RTV needs additional money, but that we would negotiate the conditions on what the leadership must do. However, this was then interrupted by the then Prime Minister Marjan Šarec, who simply said through the head of the cabinet that there would be ‘no additional money’. If I understood correctly, the idea of the LMŠ party, which saw that we were barely managing, was that RTV should first exhaust its reserves in the form of shares, and then it could get additional money. This is also indicated by the fact that the agreed interdepartmental commission for the agreed amendment of the law was formed in just 4 months!
If I am correctly informed, though I cannot guarantee the reliability here, the situation is now identical. Asta Vrečko was supposed to inform the coalition partners of the basic solution and encountered a negative stance. This is likely evidenced by how long the Ministry of Culture has been emphasising that amendments to the law concerning funding are being prepared. And the absence of a clear stance from Robert Golob that there will be an increase in the contribution and/or a change in the system of collecting funds. Or conditioning this with conditions that cannot be met!
Yes, if you live in a delusion, your thoughts are certainly wrong! Thus, the caravan moves on, and RTV Slovenia continues to decline. Yes, this too is politics and the operation of representatives of non-governmental organisations.”