“What is happening? Because of the episode of the show Utrip that I hosted, I have just received an invitation to an emergency meeting of the management team of TV Slovenia – as did the editor-in-chief of the news programme. Certain RTV journalists are demanding a suspension for me and the editor-in-chief after pressures from the Social Democrats party (SD). Journalistic and editorial autonomy are no longer being mentioned. Will at least the journalists’ group of TV Slovenia condemn Tanja Fajon’s pressuring?” journalist Jože Možina wrote. Namely, on Saturday, Možina hosted an episode of the TV show Utrip (Pulse), in which he covered current socio-political topics in 15 minutes, in accordance with journalistic standards and the truth, but after the show aired, SD President Tanja Fajon and a larger part of the left got upset and started going after him for it.
Jože Možina upset the Slovenian left by hosting an episode of the show Utrip on Saturday, which offers a weekly review of events in Slovenia and is broadcast on the national television, RTV Slovenia. What upset the left is the fact that Možina revealed the truth about the battle in Dražgoše, which would otherwise have never been acknowledged. Namely, he published the stories of the surviving witnesses of the massacre, which call into question the communist myth of heroic partisans, which the Slovenian left has been using to its advantage for decades now in its daily political needs. With his journalistic approach, he also criticised the hitherto banned topics of the SD party worshipping the communist criminal Boris Kidrič, and the moves of the parties of the so-called Constitutional Arch Coalition (which are actually the left-wing parties of the current opposition) and their satellites, who work under the guise of being part of the civil society. Needless to say, the leftists insulted and attacked Možina, despite considering themselves the most ardent supporters of “journalistic freedom.” On Sunday, Možina and the editor of the show, Jadranka Rebernik, received an invite to a meeting, where they will have to defend themselves before the Director of the television, Valentin Areh. The meeting is scheduled for Tuesday.
President of the SD party and former RTV journalist Tanja Fajon immediately responded to the broadcast, and apparently, she also launched a public lynching within the national media outlet with her inadmissible pressuring. “The public service = the government service. At RTV Slovenia. Shameful! Both Možina and his team. There is no excuse for an editorial policy that no longer works in the interest of the public,” she wrote. Not long after that, Možina and Rebernik received the invitation to an emergency meeting of the management team of TV Slovenia.
Možina also responded to the pressuring of the SD party on Twitter, writing: “Tanja Fajon, you do not represent the interest of the public, your gross political attack and the shaming of an RTV journalist expose your terrible anti-democratic hypocrisy, which will not go without consequence, right, Sophie in ‘t Veld?” Možina was clear. He then added: “Let me make it clear – RTV is a public television, not yours. And there will be no appeasement when it comes to the freedom of the media and the truth.
Will the associations of journalists respond to the gross attack on journalistic freedom?
Such political attacks on the freedom of journalism are inadmissible, and it is even more inadmissible for the management team of TV Slovenia to give in to these pressures. Now, the question is whether the journalists of RTV Slovenia, as well as the Slovene Association of Journalists, will condemn Fajon’s pressuring. We have sent the aforementioned organisations this exact question but are still waiting for their response, and we will also inform the international public about what is happening on RTV.
Sara Kovač
