The network of academic solidarity and engagement strongly reacts and criticizes the Rulebook on conditions and criteria for issuing a license to provide a media service, which was recently adopted at a session of the Regulatory Body for Electronic Media (REM). Namely, within the Rulebook, there was no part in Article 29, which states the types of programs and to what extent a certain type of program will be represented, and which in the previous Rulebook also spoke about what is considered a quality program: "A quality program is considered a program in which scientific-educational, cultural-artistic, documentary or children's programs, i.e. programs for minors, together or individually make up more than 20% of the total annual published program".
During the allocation of the national frequency to the broadcasters who applied for that position in 2023, numerous irregularities were observed, including non-compliance with the criteria of profession, professionalism and program quality. All the televisions that received national coverage could not clearly and precisely prove that they met the program quality criteria. For some future allocations of national frequencies to broadcasters, obviously, this will no longer be necessary.
MASA advertises itself in this way, because it wants to emphasize that omitting quality means giving up development priority, top performance, standards of excellence, moving away from the "characteristics of the entity that relate to the possibility of it meeting established and expressed needs". This approach of REM shows that quality, as a criterion, is not so important, as the previous broadcasters carrying the national frequency have shown many times. Unfortunately, there is a lack of concern about the mentioned program areas at other levels as well. Education is being ruined, the state's relationship with culture is disastrous, science is facing the challenge of dogmatic indoctrination of young people, who are becoming more and more conservative, tending towards anti-intellectualism and are more and more subject to stereotypes and prejudices.
MASA insists on reviewing the new Rulebook of REM, involving the professional public in an open, high-quality exchange of arguments and facts, which will emphasize the importance of nurturing the quality of the media program of broadcasters with a national frequency, especially in the areas of scientific-educational, cultural-artistic, documentary or children's programs.
