Main communications hub in the country has no physical security

If any sabotage were to occur at the TV transmitter on Hum hill above Sarajevo, it would not only stop television broadcasts in the country, but the entire telecommunications life in BiH would come to a standstill, BH news agency Patria (NAP) learns.

The aggressors knew this back in '92, when at the very beginning of the bloody conflicts in BiH, they shelled Hum with grenades. Disrupting telecommunications in a country, at the very least, means slowing down life in that country.

Despite the importance of this TV transmitter, which has long since become a symbol of the city on the Miljacka River, today it is far from sufficiently secured. While on one hand a large number of politicians in the country have their own drivers and security, the main communications hub in the country has no physical security - it is guarded only by cameras and workers, mostly electronics technicians, who primarily take care of the technical functionality of the transmitter.

- Politics is to blame for this. Since the TV transmitter on Hum is owned by the public radio-television services in BiH, any decision regarding this transmitter requires consensus among the three constituent peoples in BiH. However, it is apparently impossible to reach a consensus – says an employee at the transmitter for BH news agency Patria (NAP).

What gives them courage, he says, is only the radio station through which they are directly connected to the Novo Sarajevo Police Department, which is about five kilometers away from the repeater, but they respond to every call in record time.

We visited the TV transmitter on Hum a day after a young man attempted to sabotage the transmitter, as a response to the difficult economic situation in the country.

- There are always two of us, and during important television broadcasts, there are four of us. Essentially, we take care of the security of the transmitter, but it would be better if the transmitter were protected by people trained for that – say the workers.