Ministry of Information to BAJ: Neither We, Nor Journalists Need CSOs as Intermediaries

In its inquiry, BAJ asked if the Min­istry of Infor­ma­tion had a pro­ce­dure for accred­i­ta­tion of media rep­re­sen­ta­tives. The pos­si­bil­i­ty of accred­i­ta­tion is envis­aged by Art. 35 of the Law on Mass Media.

In his response to BAJ inquiry, Pavel Lioh­ki, first deputy min­is­ter of infor­ma­tion, says:

«When build­ing rela­tions between the Min­istry of Infor­ma­tion and rep­re­sen­ta­tives of both state-owned and non-state media, nei­ther of the par­ties needs medi­a­tion of var­i­ous non-gov­ern­men­tal orga­ni­za­tions, no mat­ter how respect­ed they might be, as you can as well learn from mem­bers of BAJ. We wish you suc­cess in the field of pub­lic work, if such will do good for the coun­try.»

The Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists is out­raged at such a response.

BAJ Chair­man Andrei Bas­tunets empha­sizes, jour­nal­ists join the orga­ni­za­tion pre­cise­ly for BAJ to rep­re­sent them and advo­cate for their inter­ests.

— This is a unique response in terms of the way the civ­il ser­vants under­stand their role and their work. First, the Min­istry’s response was not to the point — whether it had a devel­oped  pro­ce­dure for accred­i­ta­tion of jour­nal­ists.

Sec­ond­ly, civ­il soci­ety orga­ni­za­tions are cre­at­ed in order to rep­re­sent the inter­ests of their mem­bers. This is why more than 1,200 col­leagues have joined our inter­na­tion­al­ly-renowned orga­ni­za­tion.

And cer­tain­ly the Min­istry of Infor­ma­tion can not speak on behalf of BAJ mem­bers.

In gen­er­al, the Inter-Agency Plan on Imple­men­ta­tion of Rec­om­men­da­tions in the Field of Human Rights speaks of the need to increase civic par­tic­i­pa­tion in pub­lic admin­is­tra­tion. The Min­istry of Infor­ma­tion is among the agen­cies that are respon­si­ble for imple­men­ta­tion of the plan, — says Andrei Bas­tunets.

The Belaru­sian Asso­ci­a­tion of Jour­nal­ists is going to appeal against the response from the Min­istry.

In Sep­tem­ber, BAJ launched a study on the rules and pro­ce­dures of jour­nal­ists’ accred­i­ta­tion by gov­ern­ment agen­cies and local author­i­ties. Accord­ing to the results of a sim­i­lar research in 2017, the Min­istry of Infor­ma­tion was named among the agen­cies that are most unwill­ing to coop­er­ate with jour­nal­ists.

In 2018 study, BAJ has sent for­mal inquiries con­cern­ing the pro­ce­dure of accred­i­ta­tion of jour­nal­ists to all min­istries, state com­mit­tees, major agen­cies, local exec­u­tive com­mit­tees and region­al coun­cils. The study is to find out if the gov­ern­ment agen­cies have rel­e­vant legal pro­vi­sions on the accred­i­ta­tion of jour­nal­ists, and if not, to pro­vide a sam­ple of the doc­u­ment for adop­tion.

Pho­to Belta