“Balance Violation Remaining main Problem of TV-Companies” - Report

Gela Bochikashvili, media.ge

Charter of Journalistic Ethics and Slovak Organization Memo 98 publicized the Summery Report on pre-election media monitoring 22 November.

According to the Report, the biggest problem during the whole monitoring period was balance and impartiality.  Survey authors monitored 11 TV-Companies from 1 July through 30 September.  Monitored TV-Companies were:  First Channel of Public Broadcaster, Rustavi 2, Imedi, Real TV, Maestro, 9th Channel, Kavkasia, Channel 25 (Batumi), Rioni (Kutaisi), Mega TV (Khoni), Adjara (Batumi.)

Incomplete coverage of facts – lack of facts and “formal balance” was named in the Report as themain problem of the First Channel of the Public Broadcaster.  Survey authors counted as significant problem ignoring by the Public Broadcaster of the events like videos of torturing of inmates, leaving of the channel by journalists in protest and many other facts.

According to the survey, the First Channel acted according to balance at first sight and in specific rubrics covered all election subjects, “although the given balance was kept in those specific rubrics and not in newscasts in whole,” the monitoring report reads.  According to the survey such reports’ duration was 7-10 minutes which made the process non-dynamic.

In the Report activity of Rustavi 2 and Imedi TV is assessed as close to acceptable quality.  Events covered by those channels have been backed by facts, although in newscasts the level of “research” was low.  During the monitoring period newscasts were not balanced and coverage of news was biased.  Rustavi 2 positively covered only the United National Movement, government and President, while coverage of the Georgian Dream Coalition was negative.  Positive attitude to government was noticeable in comedy shows also.

Real TV activity is assessed in the Report as biased.  According to the report the main problems of the given channel were lack of facts, incorrect coverage of facts and polarization of opinions.  “Real TV is the television which cannot be assessed by standard criteria; terms “balance” and “impartiality” lose their sense here,” the report reads.

According to the report, newscasts coincided with quality requirements at Maestro TV.  Newscasts did not include harsh violations.  Both in Tbilisi and other different regions of Georgia the channel managed to operatively, diversely and quite often in a balanced way cover the news. “Still there was a problem of thematic diversity – for the editorial office priority and dominant topics in newscasts were politics and covering media, which left less time for other topics,” the report reads.
Program Subjective Opinion does not satisfy the criteria of balance and impartiality, which in the report is explained by the name of program.  In case of Arguments and Us programs the problem was incorrect formulation of questions.  Nino Zhizhilashvili’sPolitmeter was assessed as high quality program, although there were problems detected in the given talk-show also.

According to the Monitoring Report the quality of relevance of the 9thChannel newscasts was high, but reports were still oriented on Georgian Dream political coalition and government.  Additionally, the first political subject was being covered positively and the second negatively.

As problems of the channel were named - violation of immunity of private life, separation of facts and comments and imprecise identification. In the Report attention was paid to the presenter of Anatomy program Natia Mikiashvili, “who presented her own text to viewers as a confirmed fact.” 

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