Slovakia’s parliament approved the controversial law to dismantle the public broadcaster RTVS after all 78 legislators of the ruling left-right coalition in the 150-member parliament backed the legislation.

The law will enable the government to exercise tighter control of the broadcaster and appoint a new director-general.

The move could land the populist government in trouble with the European Commission. Vera Jourova, outgoing European Commission for Values and Transparency, said in an answer to a question from bne IntelliNews at the Prague European Summit last week that the Commission would take action if the legislation was passed, though she said the law had been softened since it was initially proposed.

Opposition legislators left the parliament in protest accompanied by the applause of the ruling coalition legislators and an ironic comment, “what a sweet life it would be without opposition,  made by Roman Michelko, chair of the parliamentary culture committee and a conspiracy writer elected to the parliament on the far-right SNS list. The opposition also vowed to challenge the bill at the country's Constitutional Court.    

The cabinet of populist Prime Minister Robert Fico, comprised of his leftist Smer party, the centre-left Hlas and the SNS, has been criticised by international press and media organisations for the law, and the opposition has argued that it breaches EU public media standards.  

“I assure you that all the content makers, who are interested in working in the public space and maintain the principle of objectivity and plurality, can really work freely and independently,” Minister of Culture Martina Simkovicova, nominated by SNS, said ahead of the vote.

Simkovicova – a former presenter at TV Slovan, a channel spreading hoaxes about the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine – filed the legislation in April, but the parliamentary approval got delayed after Fico suffered an assassination attempt in mid-May and parliamentary sessions were temporarily suspended.

RTVS employees have been on strike and part of them marched through Bratislava with taped mouths in protest at the law, which is viewed by liberal media as increasing the government’s grip on the media landscape in the country and paving the way for the end of public TV and the creation of a state television.

The legislation was also approved in a shortened legislative procedure and becomes valid on July 1, when RTVS will cease to exist and will be replaced by the new STVR. Its immediate effect will also be the dissolving of the current management headed by the CEO Lubos Machaj.  

The statutory body, which could be led by the vice chairman of the parliament Peter Ziga of Hlas, will preside over STVR before new management will be elected. The new CEO will be elected by a new STVR nine-member body, where four members will be delegated by the Ministry of Culture and five by the parliament. There will also be an ethical commission overseeing the STVR programme.

The opposition has also criticised the unclear running of the future STVR in the months ahead. “There is a month-long period for the selection procedure and only then the candidates can be submitted to the parliament. The September session begins on September 10,” Zora Jaurova, vice chair of the parliamentary committee for culture and media of the opposition-leading Progressive Slovakia, was quoted as saying.

“It looks as though in the half of October, at the end of October STVR will have state management,” Michelko said.

The bill will now go to the Presidential Palace to be signed and could be a litmus test of impartiality for new President Peter Pellegrini, the former Hlas leader whose candidacy was backed by Fico's government. Pellegrini's predecessor, liberal Zuzana Caputova, opposed the bill.  

Editor-in-chief of the country’s leading daily SME, Beata Balogova, wrote on her Facebook social media profile that “in the past governments have tried to penetrate the RTVS and influence the activities of this institution. But never before has this been done in such a blatant way and as part of the main agenda of the minister of culture,” noting that Simkovicova was yachting in Croatia when the legislation was presented in  parliament.

The replacement of RTVS with STVR also comes shortly after a standoff between journalists at the largest commercial television station Markiza over the cancellation of the Na telo political debate programme, where the management has been openly backed by the Slovak government and the owner of the Czech PPF Group which controls Markiza through Central European Media Enterprises (CME).

Journalists say other Slovak media have also trimmed their sales to the new political wind, notably TV station TA3 and newspaper Pravda.