It appears that the privatization of the media in Serbia is a totally futile undertaking unlikely to produce any good results. Despite the tight regulation by various laws, most of which contradicted and annulled their predecessors, no one can after all be certain that only by following the regulations he or she will manage to leave the state's caring embrace. The last word from the Federal Government in that context is the Decree, signed on November 13 by Momir Bulatovic, which merged bi-weekly "Ekonomska Politika" with "Borba", a company owned and run by the Federal Government. Then, a new editor-in-chief was appointed, several journalists suspended, some were banned from the building, and a disciplinary procedure was initiated against the hitherto editor-in-chief Milos Markovic, because of "negligence".
"We were a specialized publication and published real data. That could have been unpleasant, because we were read by government ministers," says former editor-in-chief Milos Markovic. "If it has come to someone being concerned that a newspaper may spoil government ministers, then obviously that someone does not trust his ministers. 'Ekonomska Politika' is the last publication that could have been attacked. The next one on the list is probably 'Politikin Zabavnik' [a magazine for children]."
After the decree, in a meeting with the director of "Borba", Zivorad Dordevic, the employees offered to move out of the offices, since the Decree stipulates that all companies based in the old "Borba" building would be absorbed by the state-controlled company. They were told that they could leave, but that their shares did not belong to them anymore.
Then, for the second time in one month, they were visited by the financial police [Serbian version of IRS agents]. Although before the Decree they had not found anything illegal, this time they dug up an error: free-lance collaborators do not have a contract. The explanation that these were not ordinary part-time and free-lance collaborators, but experts such as Dragoslav Avramovic [former governor of the Yugoslav National Bank], Mladan Dinkic [well known independent economist], Miroljub Labus [an opposition politician and professor of economics at Belgrade University], and Bosko Mijatovic.
Soon, a notice about a meeting of the editorial board appeared on the bulletin board. The notice was signed by the new editor-in-chief, Verica Dukanac, formerly a journalist in "Ekonomska Politika". No one showed up at the meeting. Out of 14 journalists, 10 left the newspaper, while a few were suspended and banned from the building.
Former deputy editor-in-chief Milica Kostic was accused of stealing two computer mice and a keyboard. The evidence was that her fingerprints were found on the door of her office. Because of that, she was taken to a police station and interrogated for an hour. "It was a rather clumsily staged situation, which was supposed to prove that we are not dissidents but petty thieves. Obviously, the intention was to close down the paper. We were never officially informed about anything, and read about the changes in the papers," says Milica Kostic.
New editor-in-chief Verica Dukanac was not in the mood to be interviewed and we only managed to find out from her that "the paper was absorbed by 'Borba' because the federal Government decreed so".
Economic connoisseurs greeted Eastern Orthodox New Year's eve [January 13] without a new issue of the paper, which was due on January 11. In the meantime, the journalists who left the paper are preparing to register a new, third in a row, company that will lay a claim on "Ekonomska Politika". They will probably not try to recover their masthead because, as they say, a team with 300 years of experience in this paper has its audience which is informed about everything and will not be confused.
Although the circulation of "Ekonomska Politika" never passed 3,000 copies, its influence was measured by the profile of its readers, who included highly educated individuals, businessmen, chief executives, managers, bankers and ministers. "The paper was read by the people who wanted to be informed about the true economic situation in the country," says for NIN the economist and the collaborator of the paper Mladen Dinkic. "Aware of the lies spread by the official sources, the authorities were afraid that their own cadre will be 'poisoned' by the unbiased expert analysis. Among the readers were many managers and chief executives, who are mostly members of the ruling parties, the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) and the United Yugoslav Left (JUL). They did not join the ruling parties because of ideology, but because otherwise they cannot operate in our society. Because of that 'Ekonomska Politika' was influential and did not fit the model in which all of us are supposed to be fed only one type of false information".
No one knows when the suit about the takeover of "Ekonomska Politika" will end. Until it is decided what belongs to whom, public institutions will expand and the government will either abolish the media using the Public Information Law or simply nationalize them with decrees.