MEDIA-RUSSIA: Russians Shrug Off Press Freedom Concerns

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Sergei Blagov.

MOSCOW, Jan 23 2002 (IPS) - When Russia’s last remaining independent national television station, TV6, abruptly went off air recently the event was met by somewhat muted public response.

TV6 was suddenly shut down this week after Russia’s Press Ministry complied with a court order. At midnight, a talk show host on TV6 was interrupted mid-sentence and replaced with multi-coloured test pattern stripes. Power was shut off at the studio and telephones and internet links were cut, TV6 General Director Yevgeny Kiselyov said.

The order called for the Press Ministry to immediately suspend TV6’s license, as required under a court ruling on Jan. 11 liquidating the station. Kiselyov said TV6 will contest the court order. “Lawyers are already working on it,” he said.

In recent days, President Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov and Lesin have all publicly stated their support for the TV6 channel and its staff. However, Kiselyov continued to argue that the Kremlin was behind TV6 demise.

The Russian government does not see any political agenda in the TV6 closure. Alexey Volin, the cabinet deputy chief of stuff, was quoted as saying; “It was just an accomplishment of court order,” Volin stated.

Press Minister Mikhail Lesin, who gave the order to switch off TV6, said that a tender for the channel will be held on March 27. Guennady Seleznyov, speaker of the State Duma, the lower chamber of the Russian parliament says TV6 shutdown was caused by ill-thought confrontational moves by the company’s management.

In TV6’s case, a pension fund for Russia’s biggest oil company LUKOIL, held a 15 percent stake and won a court case to close the station, saying it was bankrupt.

By pulling the plug, authorities silenced a team that, first at NTV and then at TV6, dared to criticise military tactics in Chechnya and expose alleged corruption scandals in the Kremlin. NTV journalists resorted to high-profile protest action, while the authorities remained ominously silent. NTV journalists refused to accept the move, arguing it was illegal and had the true goal of establishing political censorship over the station. The NTV logo in the left corner of the TV screen was stamped by the word “protest” in red letters.

In early 2001, NTV journalists seemingly enjoyed a broad public support. A sanctioned rally in downtown Moscow to support NTV attracted 10,000-15,000 people, and thousands came to Ostankino, Russia’s main television headquarters, to support NTV. However, public protests failed to change the fate of NTV.

Following NTV’s takeover by state-controlled natural gas monopoly Gazprom, most TV6 staff were recruited from NTV. But TV6’s owner, billionaire former Kremlin insider Boris Berezovsky, is unpopular among ordinary Russians.

No big wonder that many Russians tend to shrug-off the TV6 shut- down. According to an opinion poll by ROMIR-Gallup International, 26 percent of the Muscovites said they viewed the conflict over TV6 as an economic dispute. Only 15 percent of those polled regarded the conflict as the Kremlin’s onslaught on press freedom.

Therefore, in the eyes of many Russians the media freedom agenda arguably has become less important and relevant. Thus, while the fate of the only independent national television station has been decided it is unclear whether other media outlets that have challenged the Kremlin policies may still survive in Russia.