The city administrations of Niš and Vranje paid millions of dinars from their budgets to pro-government tabloids, and especially to Informer. It is a systematic abuse of the media law, says Professor Rade Veljanovski
The company Insider team doo, which is the owner of the pro-government tabloid Informer, received more than 1,4 million dinars from the City Administration of Niš, as well as almost 2,8 million dinars from the City Administration of Vranje, for advertising services this year alone, "Južne vesti" writes.
The latest tender that Insider team doo won in the south of Serbia is the tender of the City of Vranje for advertising services, worth 2.799.960 dinars including VAT. The decision to conclude that contract was made recently, on March 17 of this year.
The Niš Administration for Property, Economy and Environmental Protection is also January 24 this year, made the decision to conclude a contract with the Insider team.
That contract is worth a total of 1.412.640 dinars including VAT. It consists of two lots - one refers to the publication of an advertisement for the alienation of real estate and land and is worth 1,08 million, and the other to the publication of an advertisement for a public tender for the lease of office space and is worth 332.640 dinars.
This is just one micro sample of how
Informer is not the only one
From their modest budgets, cities in the south of Serbia have been allocating considerable sums for other tabloids for years.
According to Juzne vesti, the City of Niš paid for advertising in Informer with citizens' money in July 2022, 1.061.424 dinars including VAT. And then it was about an advertisement for a public tender for the lease of business premises.
That year, the City of Niš also paid 460.800 dinars for advertising for the disposal of real estate in the tabloid Alo.
Funding propaganda
Retired professor of the Faculty of Political Sciences, Rade Veljanovski, tells "Vreme" that this kind of practice is not rare, especially since the legal reforms in Serbia introduced the possibility of project co-financing of the media.
"The first idea for financing media of this type was to finance media that are small, local and cannot survive on the market from public money, that is, from the budget from local self-governments to the state," explains Veljanovski.
However, then the government started to manipulate the legal provisions, so there was a situation where the media, which already have a lot of money, get these funds.
"That's what Vučić meant recently when he said that the media is financed from the bucket. It's no accident. The media receives public money, and the state finances its propaganda arsenal."
It doesn't matter to them, says Veljanovski, from which local self-government that money will go, nor how much money is in its budget. This is happening everywhere, so that those media "support the government with all their might."
""Draining" of southern Serbia
In October 2023, Niš paid another 1.135.680 dinars for advertisements in "Večernji novosti", which means that in total from 2022 until now, the City's advertising in Nišlia tabloids cost more than 4 million dinars only through the Public Procurement Portal.
Even the City of Vranje is not giving money to regime media for the first time through a tender, since in July of last year it paid 1,5 million dinars including VAT to Večernji novosti, also for advertising services.
By the way, Informer, Večernje novosti, Alo, but also Mondo, Politika, Srpski telegraf and Blic are also on the payroll of the public service Radio-Television of Serbia, which only receives about 340.000 euros per year from subscriptions to Nisli.
When asked if this kind of abuse can be prevented by applying some law, Veljanovski answers:
"At this moment, REM, whose Council we still do not have, would have to react. We do not have people who can react. We ourselves know that the REM Council is corrupt, and the election of Council members was prolonged, and that procedure was supposed to be completed in October 2024, and then it just started".
Of course, says Veljanovski, if the new Council were to continue with the old practice, it would not prevent such malfeasance either.
Source: Southern News
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