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36 I Southeast Europe bne October 2017
while print was the only channel to see a decline in advertising revenues in 2015, a trend that is forecast to continue.
More recent data shows that 2016 proved to be a turning point for some of Romania’s highest profile media outlets, with companies such as Vioculescu’s Antena 1 returning to profit during the year, while others hiked their profits substantially, according to datacompiled by media news site Paginademedia.ro.
Attack on pluralism
Nonetheless, the financial difficulties faced by independent media in Roma- nia, and the continuing importance of politically motivated owners, are having a damaging impact on media pluralism in Romania, which intensified in the last decade from the start of the economic crisis. The financially precarious situa- tion of many Romanian media outlets has put the journalists who work for them in a vulnerable position.
A study of 19 countries by the Bucharest- based Media Research Centre finds Romania has a higher risk for basic protection and observing journalistic standards. Furthermore, Popescu says
in an interview with bne IntelliNews, the index doesn't capture the full scale of the problems in Romania.
“The media pluralism monitor looks at how the market influences pluralism
but has difficulties capturing how much worse the situation is in some of the East European post-Communist countries,” she says.
“In Romania, there are very few, if
any, media outlets that are economi- cally viable except the big TV chan-
nels – and television is dominated by politically partisan channels that would be unthinkable in a West European country,” she says. This partisanship “doesn’t only affect availability of quality information, it affects the accuracy of information available.”
The survey shows Romania is very high in political partisanship in all outlets and very low in accuracy, even in the most highbrow outlets. This differs from, for example southern Europe where the
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information may be politically coloured but it is not devoid of real content. “Part of the problem is that media channels are so unprofitable, we were in project with journalists, the problem to recruit and keep journalists long enough to train on job,” Popsecu stresses. In addition, there is no effective media regulator, nor an industry body that effectively self- regulates.
Moguls under pressure
Popescu believes that while the so-called media moguls entered the business for different reasons, all had the idea that the outlets they own are “theirs and should serve their commercial and politi- cal interests”. It’s also ego driven, she says, giving the example of one mogul who claimed he “just wants his voice to be heard”.
Some of the country’s leading media owners suffered a severe blow to their egos when their operations were inves- tigated by the National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA) and resulted in prison terms for some, although they still pull the strings from behind the scenes.
Voiculescu, who owns one of the most influential TV news stations in the country – Antena 3 – was sentenced to 10 years in prison in August 2014 after
than 10 during his short stint in prison.
Voiculescu fits the profile of the politi- cally influential media owner perfectly; he was the founder of the Conservative Party and the mastermind behind the Social Liberal Union (USL) coalition, which ruled Romania from February 2011 to February 2014. He, and the journalists at his TV station, claim there were political motivations for his impris- onment; the tycoon is a harsh critic of both former President Traian Basescu and DNA head Laura Codruta Kovesi.
Another media owner, Vantu, has received several sentences, the longest of which was an eight-year sentence
for money laundering in connection
to the collapse of the Ponzi-style
FNI investment scheme. He also has sentences connected to the bankruptcy of oil services company Petromservice, for helping Nicolae Popa, who was indicted in the FNI case, to evade justice, and for blackmailing fellow media baron Sebastian Ghita.
Unlike Vioculescu, who continues to claim he was unfairly imprisoned, Vantu has been unusually candid about his criminal activities, saying in a 2014 interview with Adevarul that he would have been issued a life sentence if the
“Their operations were investigated by the National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA) and resulted in prison terms for some”
being found guilty of the fraudulent privatisation of the Institute of Research for Food Sciences. He later received another two-year sentence for complic- ity to blackmail the former manager of cable TV network RCS&RDS, but was acquitted in June this year. The follow- ing month he was released on parole despite having served only three years
of his original sentence, due to his old age, good behaviour and ability to take advantage of a loophole allowing prison- ers to knock 30 days off their sentences for each scientific work penned while behind bars. Voiculescu authored no less
state had found out all he had done, even though he still claimed to have been sentenced for the wrong reasons.
“[Prosecutors] made up some reasons and for those I was arrested, not for what I have really done. I don’t contest the fact that I have been sent to prison. I deserved to go to prison,” he told
the daily.
Ghita, who took over Realitatea TV from Vantu, is now also in difficulties. He is being investigated by the DNA in con- nection to several corruption scandals