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‘It would be better to publish any of our decision on our portal first, and later this may become a piece of news’, said Nicolae Spataru to support the decision to examine this issue of the agenda without the media being present. He also said that personal data of the candidates could be discussed during the meeting, thus it would be better to hold it without the media being present.
The SB member, Violeta Cojocaru, explained that the candidates' files, with blurred personal data, would be published after the meeting.
‘We don’t mention personal data during the public meetings’, the SB member Larisa Calugaru replied, but her argument was not taken into account.
Contacted by Media-azi.md to find out the decision of SB members, Nicolae Spataru said that all files were eligible and all three candidates that initially applied were admitted to the contest: the current ‘Teleradio-Moldova’ Executive Director, Olga Bordeianu, the journalist and politician, Ion Terguta and the TRM employee, Cornelia Stefoglu.
The contest started with delays, and for exceeding the legal term, the Broadcasting Council voted, on 30 July, the proposal to dismiss the current membership of the SB.
Note that the MP Lilian Carp (PAS faction), Deputy Chairperson of the Parliamentary Committee for Culture, Education, Research, Youth, Sports and Media, announced, during the 2019 Media Forum, that he sent to the Supervisory Board a request to postpone this contest. The MP believes that the Regulation on the contest for the position of ‘Teleradio-Moldova’ Executive Director contains incomplete provisions. ‘The SB, which must guarantee a balanced contest for the position of TRM Executive Director, developed a Regulation, which restricts the right of certain people to apply for this position’, said Lilian Carp.
According to the MP, online journalists deserve to participate in this contest, because there are a lot of competent people who work in the online environment that could be good managers, including at TRM, but due to the conditions laid down in Regulation – five years of work experience in the broadcasting area and 10 years of work experience in the media – they cannot participate in the contest.
The MP also said that although he sent to the SB an official request for the annulment of the contest, the Boards did not take it into account.
At the same time, the Executive Director of the Electronic Press Association (APEL) Ion Bunduchi, mentioned that it is good for online journalists to participate in the contest, but, according to him, there would be legal problems in this regard. ‘How to include the concept “online media” in the law if it does not have any legal definition? Who will be able to decide whether a person is a media journalist or not given the fact that several additional draft laws were developed but were not voted by the Parliament?’, asked Ion Bunduchi, during the same Forum.
In his turn, Nicolae Spataru told Media-azi.md that there was no obstacle for people who worked in the online media to participate in the contest. ‘I ask you to open the explanatory dictionary and see how media is defined. That definition also includes concepts like “online” and “Internet”. Thus, all those who wanted to participate in the contest submitted their files’, claims Spataru.
Asked by Media-azi.md, the Executive Director of ‘Teleradio-Moldova’, Olga Bordeianu, mentioned that she applied for the contest because she wanted to continue her activities within the company. She claims that, at the moment, she knows better all the issues and knows in what direction to move.
On 4 June 2015, Olga Bordeianu was elected as Executive Director of TRM, accompanied by scandal. In a press release, the media NGOs stated then that ‘Teleradio-Moldova’ mimicked the democratic election of the Executive Director of the national public broadcaster and asked the honorable resignation of those five CO members who voted for Olga Bordeianu. But neither the Broadcasting Coordinating Council nor the Parliament did not challenged the way the contest was held.
Another candidate, Ion Terguta, worked as journalist and media expert (during 2009-2016 he was the Director of the Moldovan National Representation Office of TRCI ‘Mir’). In 2015, he applied for the position of head of the public TV channel, Moldova 1, but he was not elected. This year, Ion Terguta ran in the parliamentary election from the ‘ACUM’ Bloc. Previously he has been the Deputy Chairperson of PLDM since 2018, and spokesperson of this party since 2017.
Cornelia Stefoglu works at the public TV channel Moldova 1. Previously, (in 2013), Cornelia Stefoglu participated in the contest for the position of the head of News and Debates Department at ‘Moldova 1’, which was won by the journalist, Vitalie Gutu. She challenged the result of the contest in the court, saying that ‘the file submitted by Vitalie Gutu in the contest was incomplete’. Thus, the court obliged the Executive Director of ‘Teleradio Moldova’ to cancel the order according to which Gutu was appointed in this position. Cornelia Stefoglu is one of the journalists, who officially participated in the international visits made abroad by the former communist president of the Republic of Moldova on behalf of ‘Teleradio Moldova’.
According to the Regulation, only citizens with higher education, who know the Romanian language and an international language, have at least 10 years of work experience in the media and five years of work experience in the broadcasting area could participate at the contest. The winner of the contest will be considered the person who will receive at least 2/3 of the votes of the total number of the SB members. According to the Audiovisual Media Services Code, the Executive Director of the ‘Teleradio Moldova’ PI is appointed on the basis of a contest, for a seven year term.
