During Christmas 2000, employees of public service Czech Television staged a successful rebellion against the appointment of a new Chief Executive, Jiri Hodac. Czech television employees accused Hodac of political bias. After hijacking the news and current affairs broadcasts, prompting mass demonstrations in the centre of Prague and winning the support of an important opposition group, they forced him to give up his appointment in early January 2001. But the rebellion has seriously compromised the integrity of Czech public service television, casting doubt over the future of public service television broadcasting in the Czech Republic.
Since the fall of communism, Czechoslovakia and then the Czech Republic have experienced difficulties in the sphere of the media, especially in the television industry. Incompetence, nepotism and the impact of vested interests have gone hand in hand with weak media regulation. This has been the case for both private and public service television.
Under communism, Czechoslovak Television was a state instrument for disseminating propaganda. Since the communist authorities knew well that the population was not particularly interested in its television news and current affairs, it specialised in escapist entertainment. Czechoslovak television provided soma to the population: it entertained its viewers with its special brand of undemanding, middle of the road, non-political programming.
After the fall of communism, the situation remained largely unchanged. Ivo Mathe, the Chief Executive of Czech Television from 1992 to 1998, primarily focussed on entertainment. News and current affairs remained neglected. Communist propagandists were forced out but the newsroom was filled with inexperienced youngsters. With the dissolution of Czechoslovakia in 1992, the federal TV station was abolished and a small, basically regional Czech TV assumed dominance. An inexperienced local team which had until then only produced early evening regional news and short news bulletins took over responsibility for nationwide news and current affairs programming.
Thus Czech TV news and current affairs broadcasts assumed the appearance of student television transmissions, with thinly veiled political bias. Staff were primarily guided by their anticommunism, having only weak notions of impartiality and critical detachment. In the first half of the 1990s, Czech public television never criticised President Vaclav Havel, and supported the right wing government of Vaclav Klaus. When Klauss reforms failed in 1997, the Czech television newsroom anticommunists regrouped and started supporting the Freedom Union, which had splintered off from Klauss party.
Bureaucracy and accountability
In 1998, the Council for Czech Television, appointed by Parliament, declared itself unhappy with the inferior quality of news and current affairs. The Council appointed a new chief executive, Jakub Puchalsky. Puchalsky chose Ivan Kytka to head News and Current Affairs. An experienced journalist, Kytka had worked as London reporter for the Czech News Agency and then Czech Television for many years.
Kytka tried to professionalise the news and current affairs department and make it publicly accountable. Above all, he attempted to break the informal decision-making structures within the department, which were typical for Czech Television, a cumbersome bureaucracy of some 3000 employees. He was forced to resign within seven weeks of being appointed. (He now works for the BBC in London.)
This was the first rebellion by employees of Czech Television against external attempts at reform. Kytka was accused of being incapable of communicating with staff, of incompetence, of being a puppet of the Social Democratic Party. Similar arguments were used against Hodac two and a half years later.
The story of Kytkas abortive attempt to reform the news and current affairs of Czech Television set the tone for what happened next. After his departure, no senior staff at Czech Television dared to interfere again with the fossilised structures of the news and current affairs department. The Chief Executive Puchalsky himself resigned before Christmas 1999. A new Chief Executive, Dusan Chmelicek, was appointed in February 2000. He tried to implement some of Kytkas reforms, but the news and current affairs department rebelled again. In late spring 2000, Chmelicek appointed BBC man Jiri Hodac to the new post of Director of News. Staff again resisted and Hodac resigned in August 2000. Henceforth Chmelicek succumbed to the rebels, buying them off with increased funding. This extra funding pushed Czech TV into the red. The council recalled Chmelicek and hastily appointed Hodac, against the wishes of the staff, in his place.
Czech Television exploded. The December 2000 rebellion was led by the news and current affairs department, but was supported by most employees of Czech Television. They and their allies on the outside actors, broadcasters and independent TV producers were on the whole alarmed by the constant changes, and by what they saw as the danger of destabilising the whole post-communist colossus with all its informal contacts in the private sector sustained by Czech TV.
Capitalising on disenchantment
The December 2000 rebellion took place (a) because members of the news and current affairs department were afraid they might be replaced by more professional journalists, and (b) because Czech TV employees feared that the new Chief Executive would make the internal financial flows transparent.
Czech public service television is funded by a TV licence fee of some £16 annually. This seems cheap. But with average monthly pay of approximately £220, it is actually thirty per cent more expensive than the UK. The licence fee provides some sixty per cent of overall income the balance is made up by advertising. A Price Waterhouse Coopers audit in May 2001 warned that Czech television lacks appropriate inspection mechanisms for financial flows within the organisation as well as for funds directed to outside contractors. Even today, Czech TV still refuses to provide information even about the cost of its individual programmes, although it is duty-bound to do so by law.
The December 2000 rebellion was temporarily successful because it was cast as a struggle against government intervention and for freedom of speech. In fact, there was no external pressure on freedom of speech, and it was often the journalists themselves who were unwilling to tackle politically sensitive issues. The rebels managed to turn an internal labour dispute into a nationwide political crisis, by capitalising on peoples disenchantment with Klauss Civic Democratic Party (which, though not itself in government, in practice rules the country in tacit coalition with the governing Social Democrats by means of the so-called opposition agreement). The rebellion became a vehicle for the opposition politicians from the Freedom Union party to gain political points. It was turned into a political conflict between Havel and Klaus.
For years, frustrated Czech political parties which have been shut out of politics by the opposition agreement, especially the Freedom Union, have been trying to break into mainstream politics by the back door. In this, they have been using the political philosophy of the Czech President, Vaclav Havel (who has always been close to the Freedom Union). Cas Mudde, a political scientist from Edinburgh University, has called this Havels intellectual populism. Havel argues that the Czech political class is corrupt and that power must be taken away from politicians by the morally pure nation. The proponents of this view (who are, paradoxically, themselves politicians) have launched various civic initiatives, the purpose of which has been to cast doubt on the legitimacy of the political parties in power. These initiatives (including the mischievously named Thank you, Leave Now initiative), culminated in the rebellion at Czech Television.
The ruling Social Democratic Party buckled in face of the TV rebellion and the power of the TV screen to bring tens of thousands of people into the streets. Klauss Civic Democratic Party refused to yield to the rebels and so it bore the brunt of the vilification in the rebels TV broadcasts. Klauss party has since been pushed to the margins of Czech politics. The Social Democrats, and the Freedom Union supported by the rebels, are discussing the possibility of a coalition.
Viewing an uncertain future
But what has happened to television since January 2001? After Hodacs resignation, the Council for Czech Television was disbanded by parliament the ruling politicians took fright at the ability of TV staff to mobilise mass demonstrations, so they punished the council. A temporary Chief Executive was selected by parliament: one Jiri Balvin, a former Czech TV manager who had been sacked in 1998 for financial irregularities. Since assuming his post, Balvin has fully yielded his authority to the television rebels, while pretending to parliament that he has been fulfilling its wishes. Rebels were promised that they would retain their posts, although recently two prominent rebels have been demoted for incompetence, and the rebel faction seems demoralised.
Since January 2001, Czech television has broadcast a number of defamatory programmes aimed at discrediting critics of the Christmas rebellion. The quality of news and current affairs has gone rapidly downhill, and viewing figures have dropped. Audience share for Czech TV seems to have shrunk by some twelve per cent. Figures for CT 1, the main public service channel, have crashed most steeply from 24.28% in 1999 to 20.91% in the first quarter of 2001. CT 2 (the refuge of the middle-class intellectual and increasingly a haven for mediocre documentary film-making) holds on to around seven per cent of audience share. Some members of the new Council for Czech Television are now openly talking about the need to privatise CT 1, and it is difficult to see how the minority cultural channel CT 2 could survive on its own.
Public service audiences are leaking to the commercial channels. There is a more or less direct correlation between the decline in the Czech TV share and the rise in viewing figures for Nova TV, a crass commercial channel launched in 1994 by Ronald Lauder, the son of cosmetics baron Estée Lauder.
Early in 2001, Czech parliament hastily approved a new version of the Law on Czech Television, extending the number of members of the Council from nine to fifteen, and making members individually recallable, should the Parliament come to dislike them. The new version of the law also stipulated that the meetings of the Council for Czech TV must be open to the public, but when a new Council was eventually elected in June 2001, it started meeting behind closed doors. Recently, my colleague, journalist Tomas Pecina, gatecrashed one of these meetings and refused to leave, citing this law. The council will probably try to ensure that he, or anyone else, is prevented from doing this in the future.
When the TV rebels protested against Hodac in December 2000, one of their arguments was that the then Council for Czech Television was illegitimate, since it had been appointed by parliament and its members had displayed allegiance to parliamentary political parties. But, in effect, all Councils for Czech TV since the fall of communism had been appointed by parliament in such a way that the balance of power on the Council reflected the momentary balance of power in parliament. The appointment of the latest Council is no exception; surprisingly, the TV rebels have not raised any objections to it. This may be because there are a number of Freedom Union supporters on the new Council.
No television station in the Czech Republic broadcasts impartial news and current affairs. It is a matter of regret that Czech public service television has discredited itself since the Christmas 2000 rebellion, losing the remnants of its public service status. It seems that Czech society lacks the awareness, the knowledge and the will to sustain a quality public service television station. In the long term, the future of Czech Television is in great doubt.