The Media Advocacy Coalition sees that the practice of discrimination and persecution of employees in public broadcasters continues, which, together with human rights violations, poses a serious threat to the idea of public broadcasting.
On 29 April 2022 it was revealed that journalists Imeda Darsalia, Tamta Janadze and Sopho Zedelashvili had been dismissed from the Public Broadcaster. Earlier in February, they said that there had been attempts at censorship on the part of the Public Broadcaster [leadership], and that the so-called editorial decisions in the Broadcaster were guided by the so-called “black lists”. It should be noted that Sopho Mtivlishvili, another former journalist of the programme, also speaks of censorship attempts.
The Public Broadcaster cites the dismissal of the journalists as due to their public dissemination of “unfounded and false statements, which have questioned the Public Broadcaster’s independence and impartiality in editorial decision-making, resulting in significant damage to its reputation”.
Transparency International – Georgia, a member of the Media Advocacy Coalition is defending the interests of all three dismissed Public Broadcaster employees.
On 28th April 2022, it was announced that Aleksandre Tkhilaishvili, who presented the “Utskho Suneli” show (which means “Blue Fenugreek” in Georgian), has been dismissed from the Public Broadcaster’s Adjara television.
The Adjara Public Television Union believes that the reasons given for ending the employment contract and the procedures followed are part of an ongoing campaign of harassment against members of their union.
