MEP says European Parliament concerned over Vucic’s use of Telekom Serbia

N1

Thijs Reuten MEP told N1 on Thursday that the power that President Aleksandar Vucic wields through Telekom Serbia is a cause for concern in the European Parliament.

„A host of SNS-linked actors are trying to cajole whatever parts of Serbia’s independent media they have not yet destroyed into parroting the government’s line, with the assistance of massive amounts of state aid and, ridiculously, a loan from the European Investment Bank. To add insult to injury, Telekom Srbija brazenly flouts EU sanctions by broadcasting Putin’s RT propaganda. The message of these amendments: that’s absolutely unacceptable. Especially in a country that’s still a candidate for EU Membership,“ Reuten said.

According to the MEP, No problem is worse than this massive concentration of abused power. „Directly in the hands of Vucic’s autocratic ruling party, which is purposefully trying to bully the few remaining critical outlets, like N1, off the air,“ he said.

The MEP said its multifaceted strategy makes Telekom Srbija hard to pin down. Sometimes it just throws its massive taxpayer weight around, such as when it spent 100mnEUR a season on exclusive Premier League rights to draw viewers away from opposition-friendly private operators. In other cases, such as by licensing the Euronews franchise, its strategy is deliberately deceitful. In all instances, Telekom Srbija stifles dissent and amplifies disinformation.

„Vucic’s signal could not be clearer. Except if we count Hungary as democratic, his Serbia has not the slightest ambition to become an EU democracy. The EU must finally learn to take this at face value,“ he said.

He warned of what he called cosmetic changes of the law which are meaningless if the state eats up the remaining independent media.

„The whole point of the media strategy was to improve press freedom. That has not improved. So: no. I am not satisfied. Cosmetic legal progress might earn you a few spots on the World Press Freedom Index, but that’s meaningless if the state bit by bit gobbles up all remaining independent media. Nobody has the guts to seriously implement the strategy. To be fair: it would be weird if they did. Its meaningful implementation would entirely undermine the SNS propaganda machine the Serbian government is pouring hundreds of billions of dinars into,“ he added.

A large number of amendments to Bilcik’s report name Telekom Serbia as an instrument to increase the influence of the SNS in the media.