Brussels, 12/06/2013 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday 12 June, the day after the temporary closure by the Greek government of Greek public television channel ERT, the European Commission said it had not been consulted about the decision.
Commission spokesman Olivier Bailly said that the Greek government had made its decision “completely independently” and there was no connection between the decision and the current round of talks in Athens with the troika of lenders (European Commission, European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund). He said the Commission had been informed about the decision the previous evening, when the news had been made public. A Greek government spokesman, Simos Kedikoglou, told Reuters that the decision had been taken six weeks beforehand and had nothing to do with the failure on Monday to sell off state gas company DEPA (see EUROPE 10864) or the troika's return to Greece.
On Tuesday evening, Athens announced the news that the state television channels ERT were to close that very evening until the autumn. In the meantime, it will be slimmed down and restructured under a new name, NERIT SA. The current 2,656 staff members will receive compensation and will be able to apply for jobs in the new television company, said Kedikoglou, adding that ERT was an exceptional case of lack of transparency and incredible expenditure. He said the new company would have a budget of €100 million, a third of ERT's budget.
The Commission said the decision was part of Athens' efforts to modernise the Greek economy and improve the functioning of the public sector. It added that the role of public broadcasters is an important part of European democracy and the Greek government had pledged to launch a new media company shortly that will be financially viable.
The Greek press says that the decision will isolate the party of Antonis Samaras because it was taken without the agreement of the other coalition parties. Newspaper Ekathimerini reported on Wednesday that the PM's partners, PASOK and DIMAR, were working on a proposal that could cancel the closure decision. The two parties have already said that they will not vote for the decision when it is presented to parliament.
Chain reaction. Demonstrations were held on Tuesday evening and ERT staff ignored the decision and continued to broadcast online on Wednesday. The trade unions have called a 24-hour general strike for Thursday. GSEE described the decision as a “coup d'état” by the government, which continues to take extremely anti-democratic decisions. European and international journalist federations EFJ and IFJ jointly called on the government to reverse the decision. EFJ president Mogens Blicher Bjerregard said: “It will be a major blow to democracy, to media pluralism and to journalism as a public good in Greece”.
In a press release, UER (Union Européenne des Radio-télévision) said it was shocked by the Greek government's decision and expressed, on behalf of all public service media in Europe, dismay at the sudden closure of ERT. The UER president is sending a letter to the Greek PM, Antonis Samaras, asking him to do all in his power to reverse the decision, and is asking the president of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso, to back his request. The UER says that independent public service broadcasters lie at the very heart of democratic societies and any major change should only be made after wide, open and democratic parliamentary debate. UER is prepared to intervene and put its expertise at ERT's disposal (ERT was a founder member of UER when it was created in 1950) to help it make the cuts necessary to ensure better management of public money and enable it to remain a genuine public service broadcaster, in the unadulterated European tradition.
MEPs were quick to react. The GUE/NGL described it as a new attack on jobs that had been decided unilaterally without any consultation with trade unions or prior notice and without a debate in parliament. Rebecca Harms (Greens/EFA, Germany) said: “If there had been a serious intention to reform the broadcaster, the government could have committed to a joint project with employees, civil society and institutions, through a democratic process”. Greek MEP Nikos Chrysogelos (Greens, EFA) said: “It should be inconceivable that a democratic state could shut down a public broadcaster, depriving 2,600 employees of work, with no prior dialogue”. MEP Françoise Castex (S&D, France) said that, more than anything, the decision was an illustration of the violence of the troika's demands in the country that was the cradle of democracy in Europe. Guy Verhofstadt, the head of the ALDE Group, called on Samaras, to accept responsibility: “I regard the Greek government's decision to shut down all state-run broadcasts as a very provocative one rather than a sincere attempt to reform, restructure and cut down on inefficiencies and wastefulness”. Theodoros Skylakakis said: “ERT had not been fulfilling its purpose for some time already, it was operating at an immense cost and with a clientelist hiring policy, including those of the current government”. (EL and IL/transl.fl)