REM, N1 and Nova S: Four Members Say Council Never Voted

Four members of the Council of the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Media (REM), Dubravka Valic Nedeljkovic, Ira Prodanov Krajisnik, Mileva Malesic and Rodoljub Sabic, said on Saturday, October 24, that the Council neither discussed nor voted on the alleged breach of election silence by the television channels N1 and Nova S. They want REM to withdraw the disputed statement, and they are informing ODIHR and other domestic and foreign election observers about the case.

Yesterday, October 23, we reported that REM had warned N1 and Nova S over election silence. Today the four Council members say that the statement, which several media outlets carried as an official REM decision, was published without any decision by the Council. Snap parliamentary elections are held on Sunday, October 25. Election silence began at midnight between October 22 and 23 and lasts until polling stations close at 8 p.m.

What did REM say on October 23?

The disputed statement appeared on October 23, and Informer carried it in full. It says that on the morning of that day, content incompatible with the election silence obligations was spotted in the programming of N1 and Nova S. It lists the following time slots:

• Nova S, the show “Wake Up”: 7:53 to 7:55 a.m. and 8:02 to 8:18 a.m.
• N1, the show “New Day”: 8:03 to 8:04 a.m.
• N1, the show “News”: 8:21 to 8:22 a.m.

The statement does not say what the segments contain. It recalls that, in its words, “campaign programming must not be shown 48 hours before election day and on election day until polling stations close.” REM’s professional service, it goes on, informed the editors of both channels about the content it spotted, and the regulator announced it would keep monitoring programming during the silence.

Why do four members say this was not a Council decision?

According to their statement, the session scheduled for October 23 could not be held, and the alleged silence breach was not even on the agenda:

“The Council session held on October 23 could not even have been held for lack of a quorum, and the question of the alleged breach of campaign silence by N1 and Nova was not even proposed as an agenda item,” said Valic Nedeljkovic, Prodanov Krajisnik, Malesic and Sabic in a joint statement.

They point out that under the Law on Electronic Media the Council adopts the regulator’s acts and decisions, and they draw a line between the Council and the professional service:

“The professional service can monitor programming, establish facts and prepare expert findings, but it cannot, without a Council decision, determine on behalf of REM that a particular media service provider has broken the law, nor present such a conclusion to the public as a decision of the regulator,” the Council members stress.

They also fault the media that carried the statement as a decision:

“It is particularly worrying that some pro-government media immediately began spreading this non-existent Council decision as fact. Headlines such as ‘Official confirmation from REM: N1 and Nova S broke election silence’ and ‘REM officially confirmed’ were published, which presents the public with the idea that the competent REM body made a decision that was never made,” they state.

They also argue that the document was published in the regulator’s name without the signature of a responsible person, and they put their conclusion this way:

“The fact that a document of this content was published in the name of an independent regulatory body without a decision of its Council, without the signature of a responsible person and without any information on who decided to publish it speaks of the complete capture of this institution by the authorities during the election campaign.”

The closing part of the statement contains its sharpest wording, this time addressed to observers:

“The fact is that REM, as we hereby inform ODIHR and other foreign and domestic observers, was first blocked by the actions of members close to the authorities, and that now, in the middle of the election campaign, it has been formally and in practice hijacked. A regulator that should protect the equality of participants in the election process has been turned into an instrument of the authorities for producing and distributing politically convenient news and false ‘decisions,’ bypassing all procedures prescribed by law.”

They describe the misuse of REM as a criminal offense: “this is no longer just a matter of obstructing the regulator’s work, but an open takeover of its institutional function for the purpose of political pressure and discrediting independent media, which also constitutes a criminal offense for which responsibility must be established.”

What do they demand from REM and from the media?

The four members demand that it be established immediately:

• who drafted the statement and approved its publication in REM’s name
• who authorized the professional service to address N1 and Nova in the manner described in the statement
• on the basis of which Council act the public was told that the law had been violated
• how information presented as “REM’s official confirmation” reached the media before the Council had decided on the matter at all

Until this is clarified, they want REM to withdraw the disputed statement and publicly tell the media that the Council has not adopted any decision finding that N1 and Nova broke election silence. They expect media that reported REM had “established” or “officially confirmed” a breach to correct the information.

What did Sabic tell Danas?

Rodoljub Sabic told Danas that he does not know who made the decision and that the four independent members certainly did not vote on it, which in his view raises the possibility that the criminal offense of abuse of office was committed. He also says that Council president Stevica Smederevac, even in connection with the failed session, did not say a single word about the alleged silence breach as a possible agenda item. He described the session itself this way:

“This fabulous act, whatever it may be, is not an act of REM because it was not adopted by the REM Council. On that very same day, the four independent Council members refused for the third time in a row to take part in a session that president Stevica Smederevac wanted to hold without the public present, so without a quorum it could not have been held anyway,” Sabic says.

On the origin of the document he also said: “How a paper of this content, without a stamp or signature, appeared in public in the name of REM is a question that may even require a criminal investigation.”

Sabic had already spoken out on the social network X on October 23, with a question about the document: “What kind of paper is this? Who is behind it? It was never at a REM Council session! None of the independent Council members has ever even seen it. Who signed this?” The pronoun “it” in that post refers to the disputed document, not to a person.

What does the other side say?

We found no response from Council president Stevica Smederevac or from REM’s professional service to the four members’ statement in the sources we reviewed before publication. The only REM position available in those sources is the October 23 statement, in which the regulator announces it will continue monitoring programming during election silence.

Vreme writes that Council member Milos Garic told Informer that REM must react to breaches of election silence, but that the body does not have full jurisdiction over N1 and Nova S. The same paper reports that Sabic, when Informer’s editors called him to comment on the alleged silence breach, replied that monitoring is the job of REM’s professional service. Vreme adds that most pro-government tabloids reported that the organization Transparentnost filed a criminal complaint against Nova S, N1 and Raiffeisen Bank over the alleged breach of election silence.