Public Broadcasting and Temptations of the Majority

Nestan Tsetskhladze, Nana Kvachadze

“You will not leave the studio without apologizing,” the anchor of the TV program “What Do People Think?” shouted to film director Eldar Shengelia during a live broadcast in 2001. Eka Beridze, the anchor, demanded an apology for his statement: “The Public Broadcasting [the “PB”] has not changed since my youth; it is still the governmental TV Company.” “We are sorry,” the journalists sitting in the studio said later. Eight years later the director of the PB did not want to show this recording again but it was done.

Levan Gakheladze, chairperson of the Board of Trustees of the PB, said former director general Levan Kubanieshvili had not mentioned the reason for resigning in his resignation letter. On July 20, the Board satisfied the resignation letter of Kubaneishvili. His term in his position was due to end April 8, 2014. Levan Gakheladze: “He filed a resignation letter with us. I hope Mr. Kubaneishvili will make a more clear explanation about his decision. I know he is planning to make comments and I think it will not be polite to speak now before he comments.”

The information about the resignation of Levan Kubaneishvili was distributed on July 14; he did not and does not reply to phone-calls or messages in the newspaper “Batumelebi”. Nor has any other media sources published his comments. Last Tuesday people started speaking that he did not want to show the 2001 recording of the program “What Do People Think?” on the program “Red Zone”. The group “We Support Gogi Gvakharia’s Project “Red Zone” was created on the social network Facebook. On the same day 600 subscribers joined the group (On July 21 their number increased to 1,277). A subscriber asked on the group of Facebook what kind of problems the TV program was facing and one of the producers of the TV program, Davit Gabunia, replied: “the extract from a video-recording became the reason for closing the program. The recording was to be shown in the first part of the program. It was an extract from the talk show of the PB “What Do People Think?” Eka Beridze was the anchor of the program.” The producer then added: “The fate of the “Red Zone”has not been decided. I doubt your support influenced the decision makers.”

The TV Program “Red Zone” is a project of the Radio “Liberty” and it was broadcast on PB on Fridays based on an agreement. The author and anchor of the program is Gogi Gvakharaia. Last Friday, the audience saw the recording of the program where many famous journalists of Georgia – Inga Grigolia, Zaza Shengelia, the former director general of the PB - apologized to film-director Shengelia for having called the channel the ideologist of the government.

Did Levan Kubaneishvili want to interfere in the editorial policy of the program and forbid them to show the recordings? The “Batumelebi” asked Davit Kakabadze, head of the Georgian Bureau of the Radio Liberty in Prague. “I have not talked with Kubaneishvili; I only emailed him. We learned about the request or demand to remove the recordings from the program from the program producer. As soon as I learned it, I emailed Levan Kubaneishvili and asked him to explain the situation to me. He immediately replied to me that he had nothing against the Red Zone. He simply wanted the producers and the author to consider his request. I explained to him that it was impossible and that the recording of the old TV Program complied with the ethical norms of journalism and suited the conception of the Red Zone. That was all; I did not hear anything from him about closing the program and ceasing the agreement with Radio Liberty.”

Teo Khatiashvili, the producer of the program, said the discussion about whether to show the recording lasted for two weeks. However, they did not discuss the issue with Levan Kubaneishvili. The mediator was Gia Gachechiladze, the producer of Cinema –Programs, who told them that showing this recording in the Red Zone was not collegial because it was about our company. “I replied that although Public Broadcasting was the legal heir of the First Channel, it is at least formally different because the previous one was officially a state TV Company and carried the governmental ideology; Public Broadcasting is a public, independent TV Channel. Furthermore, we have independent editorial policy and would not change anything. He asked what we had agreed on. “He is waiting for you answer.” I said nothing had changed. He called Levan Kubaneishvili and then called me back five minutes later and said we had to remove the recording from the program; otherwise they would not allow us to broadcast the program in this format. I replied we would not remove anything and let them block the program.”

On July 21 Gia Gachechiladze refused. He was the mediator between thhe administration of the PB and the authors of the program. Teo Khatiashvili and Gogi Gvakharia say Kubaneishvili changed his demand about the request after the head of the Georgian bureau of the Radio Liberty sent an email to him. “I have experience when my programs were closed because of similar request. I know what it means,” said Gogi Gvakharia. He added that he does not know Levan Kubaneishvili and it was a surprise for him to hear that Kubaneishvili got irritated at the program because before he had never interfered in their activities. The author of the Red Zone said: “Media is the most painful topic. It is easier to criticize Saakashvili or the opposition but it is very difficult to speak about your colleagues, friends and yourself. Criticism of the media is a taboo topic. Very often I hear the phrase: it is not collegial. I cannot understand the meaning of this phrase.” What does the request of the director general of the PB mean when he asks to block a program? Tamar Kordzaia, a media lawyer from the Young Lawyers Association, said that it is interference in the activities of the editorial board. Besides that, it can be assessed as oppression. 

Levan Gakheladze was asked whether this program was the reason for the resignation of Kubaneishvili. He answered he does not have any information about this fact, nor did the Board of Trustees tried to find out the problem. “I watched the program. Does anybody complain that something was removed from it? I have not seen or heard the statement of Davit Kakabadze. Has he talked with you? Despite my great respect for your newspaper I cannot comment on Dato Kakabadze’s statement without seeing it. I have a different style of working.”

Levan Kubaneishvili assigned his shares in the studio TBC-TV to Zaza Shengelia after he occupied the position of the director general. Zaza Shengelia was a former director of the First Channel. He was one of the participants in the program “What Do People Think?” prepared in 2001.

“TBC group, Zaza Shengelia and I are founders of the TBC-TV. You can see the amount of shares in the documents of the Public Registration Agency,” said Kubaneishvili to the newspaper “Batumelebi” in March 2009. The newspaper article was about the competition in which TBC-TV won the right to prepare for the PB the TV Programs “Great Ten People”, “Life Is Beautiful,” and “For Auto-Fans”.

PB paid 517,000 GEL for “Great Ten People”; 175,000 GEL for “Life Is Beautiful” and 145, 000 GEL for “For Auto Fans”.

Before the program prepared by the “Red Zone” – “Temptations of Majority”, a journalistic survey of the Studio Reporter “Media-Control in Pink” was shown on PB. The journalistic survey was shown by different TV Companies too and it is about the oppression of journalists by Levan Kubaneishvili, former director general of the PB.

Interview with Levan Kubaneishvili

“Batumelebi” managed to interview Levan Kubaneishvili late last night in the club “Tarabua” at the final concert of Black Sea Jazz-Festival where he was together with Zaza Shengelia and other friends. Levan Kubaneishvili said he did not want to speak about the reasons of his resignation. However he answered several questions.

-Mr. Leva, is your resignation connected with the program “Red Zone”?

-I cannot understand why this topic became so interesting… it was the correspondence between me and the head of the Radio Liberty… he had his position… I told him it was no problem. I think the program was broadcasting without any changes, was not it? This accusation resembles to the previous one when I was blamed for blocking a TV-release. However, nobody commented later that nothing was changed in that release.

-What TV-release are you speaking about?

-I mean that unidentified person who is working on investigation journalism; I forgot his name…

-Do you mean Vakhtang Komakhidze?

-Yes I do. Nobody asked later whether this TV-release was shown or not. However, it was shown without the least changes. It is stupid to blame people for nothing. Your editor is correcting something in your work, does not s/he? I think, as a head of the TV Company, have right to request some changes. I suggested them to interview the person and prepare the program with his comments. There were no complications regarding the program of Gogi Gvakharia. I was told that there were some recordings from our old program with unpleasant context. So, I emailed to Kakabadze.

-What did you write to the head of the Radio Liberty?

-I did not write anything important to start such a scandal here. It was not so important program to cause the resignation of the director general.

-What do you mean in the importance of the program?

-I mean the director general shall resign if the program is very important. It was ordinary one.

Source: Newspaper "Batumelebi"