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SARAJEVO, December 17 (FENA) - The Board of Directors of the Association of BH Journalists has offered its full support to the Independent Trade Union of BHRT workers in their demands for the urgent solution of numerous problems that endanger the livelihood of employees of this public service and future business of BHRT (BiH Public Broadcasting Service).
The association reminds that BHRT employees held a protest two days ago against the blockade of BHRT bank accounts, "which made it impossible to pay the salaries, it has completely endangered the already difficult work and functioning of BHRT, and called into question the livelihoods of hundreds of workers and their families."
"This situation is a consequence of the decision of the RTRS management to stop paying RTV tax to the joint bank account of BHRT, which is a violation of the Law on Public Broadcasting System, and because of which BHRT now demands the reimbursement of more than 54 million KM from RTRS based on the collected RTV tax in the entity of Republika Srpska," stated the Association of BH Journalists.
The Board of Directors of the Association of BH Journalists emphasizes that the rejection to pay the RTV tax to the joint account is a political decision of the RTRS and economic blackmail that cannot be justified and tolerated in any way.
They point out that the fact that, as of the beginning of 2022, most of the territory of BiH will remain without receiving the analog terrestrial signal of BHT and FTV, is especially worrying. BHRT is thus slowly losing its position of a public broadcaster because it will no longer be able to cover 95 percent of the territory of BiH, which is their legal obligation, and employees working at these stations are justifiably worried about their jobs.
"We remind you that the establishment of a system of stable financing of public broadcasting services in BiH is one of the 14 priorities that BiH needs to meet on the road to membership in the European Union. The latest report from the European Commission for BiH states, among other things, that "three public RTV broadcasters are still under political influence, especially through politically controlled boards, with a worrying trend of self-censorship", and that the state still does not have an appropriate RTV tax collection model as it is prescribed by the law," stated the BH Journalists Association.
(FENA) S. R.
