BHRT workers protest: Will there be salaries?

(Patria) - BHRT workers organized a warning protest today, due to the blocked accounts which prevent the payment of salaries and benefits to BHRT employees. They were joined today in this struggle by several miners.

Miner Armel Jakalović said that they came today to give full support to the Union's fight for their workers' rights.

“All miners in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina are aware of the need for a public service. You have all witnessed that they are ready to plunge the entire country into darkness if miners do not produce electricity. They must be aware that the country will be in darkness if you do not inform them about these protests, if you do not broadcast the image of our country from all regions,” emphasized miner Jakalović.

Neda Tadić, a BHT1 journalist, emphasized that workers have been coming to work with a knot in their stomachs for a long time, working every day aware that their contributions have not been paid, but also aware that every salary is questionable, N1 reports.

“We have employees who have crowned their relationship with marriage here, and imagine how they are and under what stress they live. Numerous problems threaten our work. Due to the never-completed digitalization process, which has been ongoing for 16 years, led by the Ministry of Transport and Communications, for which funds for digitalization have been approved on accounts, we have reached a situation where, by decisions of the Communications Regulatory Agency (RAK), we are shutting down the main television transmitters for re-broadcasting the analog signal of BHRT and FTV, and more than 140 repeaters that are powered by that signal from those locations,” Tadić stated.

From the beginning of next year, she noted, a larger part of Bosnia and Herzegovina's territory will be without analog terrestrial signal reception from this broadcaster.

“This is important because more than a fifth of BiH households watch television via analog signal, and now, exclusively for political reasons, this right will be denied to them. BHRT thereby loses its public service status because we will not be able to cover 95 percent of the country's territory, and all employees are worried about their jobs and future,” said Tadić, stating that the employees of this broadcaster must not be collateral damage of political games and that the shutdown of Bosnia and Herzegovina's public service must not be an option.

Merima Kurtović Pašalić, a journalist and editor at BH Radio 1, stated that the uncertainty that is turning into agony has brought them here today.

“Will there be salaries? This is the question we have been asking for years. Not – when will they be, not – how much will they be, not – will they be increased, but – will they be there at all?” Kurtović Pašalić stated indignantly.

Damir Smital, president of the Independent Trade Union of Workers at BHRT, reminded that this is not the first, nor will it be the last time that the existence of BHRT employees is jeopardized in this way.

“Meal allowance has not been paid, and the payment of salaries is also in question. We will not wait three months for it to be paid. We saw that movie in 2017. This union has always advocated for the implementation of the law, but unfortunately, we live in a country where laws are selectively applied, and most often to the detriment of ordinary workers. If it is legal to block BHRT's accounts, why is it not legal to block the accounts of RTRS, which owes BHRT more than 54 million KM based on collected RTV fees in the RS, for which there are credible documents,” Smital stated.