On the 4th of May 2021, Dr. France Cukjati was a guest on the show Topic of the Day (Tema dneva), where he spoke about a series of media lies that opponents of the Janez Janša government have been launching abroad ever since the beginning of Janša’s third term as Prime Minister. Cukjati pointed out that all objective foreign analyses show that the index of democracy and freedom has risen under Janša’s leadership. The Freedom House organisation, for example, awarded the highest score to Slovenia, among all its neighbours.
On the show Topic of the Day, Dr. France Cukjati spoke about the open letter addressed to the European media, which was written by the representatives of the Assembly for the Republic (Zbor za republiko), Cathedral of Freedom (Katedrala svobode), and the civil initiative Let’s Awaken Slovenia (Prebudimo Slovenijo). As they already pointed out in the letter, the intention is to draw attention to the untruths that are appearing in the European public regarding the freedom of the media in Slovenia.
“At the cost of embarrassing an individual politician, for example, the Prime Minister, they are actually embarrassing Slovenia with their lies and fabrications,” Cukjati commented on the left-wing hysteria associated with the Prime Minister Janez Janša. The president of the Assembly for the Republic firmly rejected any claims about the relevance of Janša’s tweets to media freedom in Slovenia. “Tweets are really not the strategic issue that the European Parliament should be working on and problematising because this will not get us anywhere.”
Cukjati also pointed out how ridiculous the whole thing is if Janša really is the dictator that the left-wing media, which are responsible for spreading the untruths abroad, and the left political pole are making him out to be, while all of the major media outlets continue to constantly attack and criticise him. Cukjati believes that if Janša was really a dictator, all of the mainstream media outlets would only have to speak highly of him. This is also the best indicator of the degree of media freedom in Slovenia. Unlike during the time of Marjan Šarec, when media outlets such as Nova24TV and Demokracija were being threatened with cessation of advertising of state-owned companies due to criticism of the government, and financial pressure was also exerted, during the Janša government, all of the mainstream media are bashing the government without the slightest hesitation.
They are not expecting a response to the letter
Cukjati admitted that they do not expect a response to the open letter that was sent, in which, among other things, they also demanded an end to the spread of unilateral propaganda. “You know, this is a machinery that does not care about such individual reactions, but they still have to find out that not everything is as black and white as they imagine it to be.”
Cukjati believes that the most important thing for the media outlets from abroad is to realise that the information served to them by their left-wing colleagues from Slovenia is not actual information, but that a dirty game is being played in the background of it all. Namely, Cukjati believes that the European media are spreading untruths about media freedom in Slovenia due to ignorance and not with malicious intentions. The president of the Assembly for the Republic notes that the left in Slovenia has grown more and more hysterical in the last ten years. Cukjati believes that this is the reason why such lies are being spread ahead of Slovenia’s upcoming Presidency of the Council of the EU, as this did not happen during Slovenia’s first Presidency.
Ivan Šokić
