Brnabic Says Will Request Clarification of ODIHR’s Remarks on Media Reporting

Ana Brnabic (BETAPHOTO/MILAN ILIC)

Serbian parliament speaker Ana Brnabic on June 4 that she would request from the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) further clarification on its findings and conclusions on the June 2 local elections in the part relating to media reporting.  

Speaking on TV Prva, Brnabic said that ODIHR was critical in relation to media coverage of the ruling coalition, noting that state public broadcaster RTS had not favor the ruling party coalition, but rather the opposition, as in a debate show on RTS, the ruling party had been represented by one and the opposition by three members, meaning that 45 minutes had been allocated to the opposition and only 15 minutes to the Serbian Progressive Party representative. 

The Bureau for Social Research (BIRODI) has said that having requested additional clarification on election observation, Ana Brnabic has acted against the Constitution, the law and ODIHR recommendations. BIRODI has also said that she has also acted against the Copenhagen Declaration from 1990, which insists on separation of public and party functions, against the Serbian Constitution article defining the conflict of public and private interest of public office holders and the Anti-Corruption Act. 

ODIHR Observation Mission Head Lamberto Zannier on June 3 said that “selective media coverage” had been observed during the campaign for local elections and that public media outlets had been focused primarily on the president, the government and the ruling parties, while allocating coverage of the opposition only during the last ten days of the election campaign.