Petition against new format of Radiožurnál has been signed by 7000 people

Dear friends,

let us introduce a public initiative “We don’t want to tune over, we have no other choice” (Nechceme preladit, nemame kam) to you – the initiative against changes which occured in the broadcasting of the Radiozurnal – the 1st Channel of the Czech Radio – from 1st January 2008.

Formerly quality and prestigious channel Radiozurnal, which has been cited due to its credibility also in foreign media, suddenly changed to the broadcasting station with no broadcast intention and was renamed the “Radiobulvar“ by its listeners. Radiozurnal has been the only mass-listened radio station so far and strongly differentiated from commercial radio stations right because it was not commercial.

The author of this new braodcasting concept is a new director of Radiozurnal Barbora Tacheci. Before her appointment as director of Radiozurnal in November 2007, she had worked as a programme director in the commercial radio Frekvence 1 and as an IPB bank spokesperson.

According to Tacheci, the reason for this change was a declining number of its listeners. However, according to our opinion the number of listeners should not be the priority aspect of the radio governed by public law. The quality of broadcasting is the most important aspect.
Since 1st January 2008, Radiozurnal has approached commercial radio stations, from sound graphics and programme scheme to broadcasters, who were taken from commercial radio stations and employed in Radiozurnal.

According to the opinion of all signatories of the petition “We don’t want to tune over, we have no other choice“, this change was not successful and damaged the actual prestige of Radiozurnal.

The object of our critique is the form of broadcasting, the way how news are chosen and arranged, incompetency of the leading broadcasters, who are supposed to become new “faces“ of the radio. They make mistakes in speaking, factual mistakes, don’t pronounce and articulate properly, speak colloquial Czech and are very genial like broadcasters at commercial radio stations.

The main characteristics of new Radiozurnal:

• sensationalism (as characteristic of tabloid journalism) and a fall in seriousness in the news
• unprofessional broadcasters
• wrong diction and colloquial/expressive language
• limited selection of music based on commercial criteria

History:

Radiozurnal is the first channel of Czech Radio. It is the oldest radio station in the Czech Republic, its broadcasting started in 1923. Nowadays, the statutory Czech Radio has 11 channels.

The director of Radiozurnal is nominated by the General Director, who is nominated by the nine‑member Board of the Czech Radio. Members of the Board is voted by the Chamber of Deputies of the Parliament of the Czech Republic for the term of six years.

Petition against new format of Radiožurnál has been signed by 7000 people so far

Press release

Prague, January 15th 2008

Disagreement with the new style of Radiožurnál has been expressed by more than 7000 listeners by signing two on-line petitions. Two separate initiatives recently joined their efforts to a single and strong civic initiative called “We don’t want to tune over, we have no other choice”. Initiative has been formed by a group of 15 most dissatisfied listeners, who built and constantly update website www.iprotest.cz with documents, links, audio records and comments about recent changes in the greatest Czech Radio channel. Discussions and an on-line petition to sign are available there as well.

Group of founders emphasises their independence of any political party or initiative and also an absence of the current radio station employees and contributors among them. Group has been founded by people of various ages and professions, whose pure interest is led by common effort to discuss and adjust recent changes in their favourite radio station.

The main objectives and calls include these demands:

1 – We appeal to the management of the Czech Radio not to turn a blind eye to the wave of listenership dissatisfaction. We point out that this is the largest and the most vibrant protest in the history of the Czech Radio. Don’t forget about the Code of Ethics of the Czech Radio which includes the “listener comes first” statement.

2 – We call the management of Czech radio including the Board of the Czech Radio, to discuss our open letter from January 10th, 2008 (see www.iprotest.cz) the personal changes and the changes of the Radiožurnál broadcast scheme.

3 – We ask the management of the Czech radio including the Board of the Czech Radio to reassess the broadcast scheme and the personal changes made since January, 2008. More than 7000 signatories so far consider these changes downgrading in both the content and the form of the broadcast.

4 – We ask the management to restrain tendencies towards „tabloidisation“ of Radiožurnál.

5 – We are convicted that professional quality of new speakers and moderators is far worse than of the people, who worked in Radiožurnál during recent years and who had to quit their sessions at the end of 2007. We consider the quality of the newcomers conflicting with the Code of Ethics of the Czech radio which requests speakers to use solely literary language (with certain exceptions) and care about using correct language and creating patterns of correct language forms. Using vernacular is unacceptable.

6 – We found 41 programmes missing from the original scheme, while only 7 new appeared. One example for all: traditional programme Motožurnál for drivers and motorists has been canceled, although one of Radiožurnál objectives is to provide special programmes for different groups of
interest, including motorists.

7 – We call both general public and media and language experts to an active participation in the public discussion about the quality of current Radiožurnál.

8 – We request credible explanation why the management of the Czech radio initiated so wast changes of Radiožurnál`s scheme and its personal policy – if there was research on this subject, who was the one to order, fund, and draw it up.

9 – We call to the new executive director of Radiožurnál Mrs. Barbora Tachecí to avoid haughty and arrogant behavior in her appearances in the media and in her answers to listeners’ questions and letters. This behavior brings harm to the reputation of the Czech radio as a credible and trustworthy institution.

10 – If our calls remain unanswered and no open and wide discussion takes place, we will be forced to make more radical steps. If there will be no adequate response from Czech radio management, we are convicted there is a legitimacy to ask for major personal changes in Czech radio management.