Everywhere and everyday, almost every hour speakers from
television screens assure Russian citizens that freedom
of press and freedom to speak openly without fear is the
greatest achievement of democracy. And they say that in
the sake of this freedom we should endure everything: growth
of food-stuffs prices, skyrocketing communal services tariffs,
rise of unemployment, growth of crime, as well as drug and
alcohol addiction. However, where is the freedom which costs
us so much?
The recent developments around official printed media in
Karachayevo-Cherkessia demonstrate that we don’t have freedom
of press in our Republic and are unlikely to have it until
the governments realise that newspapers and other media
are not a toy, it is printed media which should not depend
on the whims of the authorities, but should be created and
function for the people so that to protect people from arbitrary
rule, wherever it comes from, it is the voice of people.
There certainly should be co-founders in papers, but the
key founder is still the people, the readers. And this key
unofficial founder supports printed media not for the sake
of someone else who could dispose of the media at his full
discretion. Financial flows that the Government of the Republic
allots to maintenance of the official media are taken not
from someone’s pockets but from the budget which is replenished
by means of taxes we pay rather than by the army of bureaucrats
we are feeding.
Papers contain too many official articles from different
press-services singing praises to the new bosses of life.
However, bright and honest articles, like in the paper Den
Respubliki (The Day of the Republic) sometimes make their
way to the reader via this garish flow. Such articles and
independent position of their authors who are ready to defend
justice result in attacks against the paper by the leaders
of the Republic, who would prefer to turn it into a simple
sheet of paper…
The law says that we should find out “quid prodest”. And
who will profit from the foundation of the so-called publishing
house? The papers? Their readers? The answer is negative.
The former in this case would fall under government’s control
and would not be able to express their opinion freely. The
latter would not only be deprived of objective information,
but also of the aid and defence the residents of the Republic
often seek in media as the last resort. This means that
only the Government which issued a resolution which lacks
any economic backing or reasonable arguments can profit
from it. We think that deputies of the People’s Assembly
elected by the population, i.e. “people’s servants” as we
used to say in the old days, will weigh all the pros and
cons and will really serve the people.
The Karachayevo-Cherkessian branch of the Russian United
Democratic Party YABLOKO expresses its deep concern in view
of the Resolution No 280 of the Government of the Republic
of Karachayevo-Cherkessia “On establishing of the republican
state-financed entity Publishing House Karachayevo-Cherkessia”
which will obviously lead to infringement of the freedom
of speech.
A.N.Abazov,
Chairman of the Karachayevo-Cherkessian branch YABLOKO
See also:
Freedom
of Speech and Media Law in Russia
