Belgrade - EBU Vice-President Claudio Cappon has said that public broadcasters can ensure their contribution to a democratic society only if they have adequate and guaranteed funding and are protected from the short-term ambitions of politicians by good media legislation and arms-length governance.

Mr Cappon was addressing the South East Europe Mediation Forum on a panel including Aleksandar Tijanic, director general of Radio Television Serbia, TV Romania DG Alexandru Lazescu and Mehmed Agovic, former director general of RTV Bosnia-Herzegovina.

The EBU Vice-President said he was pleased that the European Commission now acknowledges that the state of public service broadcasting in a country which wishes to join the European Union is one element to be considered during the accession process. 

Mr Agovic accused the government of Bosnia-Herzegovina of using economic leverage to obstruct investigative journalism by RTVBH into crime and corruption. He called on the European Commission to exert "active and agressive" pressure on the country's government to allow the broadcaster its independence "for the sake of democracy."

Mr Lazescu said TVR was subject to "profound instability" because of the Romanian parliament's power to reject TVR's annual report and force the resignation of its DG. He also said that six members of TVR's 11-member supervisory Board were currently employed by the broadcaster, which made it very hard to push through reforms. In the context of the new technologies, Mr Lazescu expressed fear for the survival of quality journalism, which is costly.

For his part, Mr Tijanic urged an end to "whining" and calls for assistance from Brussels.  It was up to public service broadcasters to prove why they were so important. In the seven years since he became DG, RTS has increased its audiences so that it achieves the highest ratings on more than two out every three days of the year, he said. He has also cut the staffing of RTS from 6,500 in 2004 to 3,200 today, not including 600 free-lancers. but sees the need to reduce these numbers further to 2,200 fulltime staff and 400 free-lancers.

The Forum was organised by the Vienna-based South East Europe Media Organisation (SEEMO), an affiliate of the International Press Institute. SEEMO's chairman is Boris Bergant, Mr Cappon's predecessor as EBU Vice-President.