SBB: Pro-regime TVs demand excessive fees

An SBB press release said that Srdjan Milovanovic, owner of the two cable TVs and three others also re-broadcast by SBB, wants the cable provider to pay 38 million Euro a year, more than 10 times the 3.5 million paid so far.

According to the press release, Prva and B92 have been losing viewers based on data from TV Beat and AGB Nielsen.

Milovanovic owns Kopernikus which was bought for an excessively high price by the state-owned Telekom Serbia. His twin brother is a senior official of the ruling Serbian Progressive Party (NIS) in their home city of Nis.

SBB said that the offer with the new price was delivered right after both of Milovanovic’s stations were awarded national frequencies for the next 8 years. “Evidently encouraged by that decision, the owner of Prva and B92 decided to raise the existing fees by an incredible 1,000 percent despite the fact that these channels are available for free with a plain antenna. Also, Prva and B92 are paying the government less than a million Euro a year for national frequencies while demanding that SBB pay millions for distribution,” it said adding that Milovanovic’s demand to pay the fees or remove his channels is unacceptable.

In a later press release, SBB accused Prva and B92 of hiding the demand for a higher price from its viewers. It called both stations to stop “hiding true information” from its viewers.

SBB is part of United Group along with N1.