{"id":12839,"date":"2021-12-16T12:46:20","date_gmt":"2021-12-16T12:46:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/voice.org.rs\/?p=12839"},"modified":"2021-12-16T12:46:20","modified_gmt":"2021-12-16T12:46:20","slug":"main-municipal-hygienist-local-media-mogul-in-kula","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/voice.org.rs\/en\/main-municipal-hygienist-local-media-mogul-in-kula\/","title":{"rendered":"Main Municipal Hygienist \u2013 Local Media Mogul in Kula"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n\r\nThe \u201cHerrero\u201d, LLC, owned by Radovan Kova\u010d, continued to be awarded contracts related to hygiene maintenance at public procurements after Kova\u010d became the owner of the local media outlet \u201cInformativno-propagandni centar Kula\u201d (IPC Kula). Over the past four years, \u201cHerrero\u201d, whose registered core activity is media services, has made more than RSD 10 million by cleaning the municipal building.<\/strong>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nFurthermore, the media outlets owned by Radovan Kova\u010d have received a noticeably bigger financial support from the municipality, as well as from the province and the state, than other media outlets. Basically, in under five years, the municipal hygienist has received 64 times more money than he paid for this former public broadcasting company.<\/strong>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nThe companies owned by Radovan Kova\u010d, even before he became the owner of the only local media outlet, had received exclusive contracts related to cleaning the municipal building and this practice continued after he bought IPC Kula for EUR 3,500 as the sole bidder.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nIt all started in 2014<\/a><\/u><\/strong>, when Kova\u010d\u2019s companies, first \u201cEco clean\u201d<\/strong> and then \u201cHerrero\u201d, were awarded contracts related to hygiene maintenance worth over two million dinars.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nAt the public procurement organized in March 2015, Kova\u010d\u2019s \u201cHerrero\u201d received<\/a><\/u><\/strong> RSD 2,380,000 from the local budget, while only five months later \u201cthe municipal hygienist\u201d bought the former public broadcasting company IPC Kula, which encompasses a radio station, a TV station and the \u201cKulska komuna\u201d magazine, for EUR 3,500 as the sole bidder.\r\n\r\n\r\n
A deal with billboards \u2013 a recommendation for entering the domain of public broadcasting?<\/strong>\r\n\r\nAccording to media reports, he justified his decision to switch from cleaning to media by stating that he wished to improve the local media situation and adding<\/a><\/u><\/strong> that he was no stranger to the media sector, since he and his brother had been involved in the billboard business for years. The Privatization Agency received responses from the Administration for the Prevention of Money Laundering and the Regulatory Authority for Electronic Media in which they expressed their opinion that there were no obstacles to concluding a contract with the new owner.<\/blockquote>\r\n\r\n\r\nBetween 2016 and now, the media outlets within Kova\u010d\u2019s IPC Kula, which favor the ruling coalition led by the Serbian Progressive Party, have received financial support worth several million dinars from the municipal budget, the same one that enables Kova\u010d\u2019s \u201cHerrero\u201d to earn millions by maintaining hygiene.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nOut of 3.6 million dinars allocated to media outlets from the budget of the Municipality of Kula in 2016, Kova\u010d\u2019s IPC received 3.3 million dinars, almost eight times more than the new owner paid for this local media outlet. Public criticism of this decision was issued by the Coalition of Journalists\u2019 and Media Association (JAS (UNS), IJAS (NUNS), IJAV (NDNV), ANEM and Local Press), according to media reports<\/a><\/u> <\/strong>at the time.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nThat same year, Kova\u010d\u2019s \u201cHerrero\u201d received just over two million<\/a><\/u><\/strong> dinars for cleaning services, while the connection between the municipal authorities and the municipality\u2019s chief hygienist and local media mogul continued in the years to follow, an investigation conducted by VOICE, which included inspection of the information available at the Public procurement portal, shows.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nThe price of keeping the municipal building in Kula clean has been rising each year, as so has the support to the local Q TV and Q Radio, which operate within Kova\u010d\u2019s IPC.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nAlmost 2.3<\/a><\/u><\/strong> million dinars were allocated from the local budget for cleaning and maintenance of the municipal building in 2017, in 2018 it was 2.7<\/a><\/u><\/strong> million dinars, while in 2019 the same service cost almost 3<\/a><\/u><\/strong> million dinars. This year, \u201cHerrero\u201d was awarded the same contract worth almost 3.2<\/a><\/u><\/strong> million dinars, according to the records of the Public Procurement Office.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nIn the meantime, \u201cthe exclusive cleaner\u201d of the municipal building in Kula, boasting four employees, has changed its core activity from \u201cnon-specialized wholesale trading\u201d to \u201cproduction of cinematographic content, audio and video products and TV program\u201d, as the records of the Serbian Business Registers Agency show.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nAt the same time, the municipal budget continued to allocate financial support for media projects to Kova\u010d\u2019s IPC Kula, which represents a major share of all funds to be allocated for co-financing media outlets<\/strong>.<\/a> For example, in 2015, Q TV, which still had not been registered, received 2.4 million dinars. VOICE was unable to find publicly available information about the funds allocated in 2016, but this amount in 2017 was 2.4 million. In the next three years, whenever there was an election at any level, starting from the local election in 2018, the support to Kova\u010d\u2019s media outlets grew significantly. For example, in the year when the citizens of Kula elected new members of the local assembly, IPC Kula received 3.7 million dinars from the municipal budget. This amount grew over the next two years, to 3.8 million in 2019 and 4.4 million in 2020.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nIn under five years, since Kova\u010d took over the role of a local media mogul, the state, provincial and local budgets have granted almost 27 million dinars, i.e., more than EUR 224,000 to IPC Kula for various projects. This is 64 times for than the chief municipal hygienist paid for the former public broadcasting company.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nRanka Ivanoska (VOICE)<\/strong>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\nSupport free journalism!<\/a><\/strong><\/em>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\n\r\n
\"\"<\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\nThis research was conducted with support from the Resilience Fund of the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime. All opinions or attitudes expressed in the research are those of VOICE and IJAV and do not necessarily reflect the opinions or attitudes of the Global Initiative.<\/em>\r\n\r\n\r\n
\r\n
\"\"<\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The \u201cHerrero\u201d, LLC, owned by Radovan Kova\u010d, continued to be awarded contracts related to hygiene maintenance at public procurements after Kova\u010d became the owner of the local media outlet \u201cInformativno-propagandni centar Kula\u201d (IPC Kula). Over the past four years, \u201cHerrero\u201d, whose registered core activity is media services, has made more than RSD 10 million by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11103,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1496],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-english-en"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nMain Municipal Hygienist \u2013 Local Media Mogul in Kula - Vojvo\u0111anski istra\u017eiva\u010dko-analiti\u010dki centar "VOICE"<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/voice.org.rs\/en\/main-municipal-hygienist-local-media-mogul-in-kula\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Main Municipal Hygienist \u2013 Local Media Mogul in Kula - Vojvo\u0111anski istra\u017eiva\u010dko-analiti\u010dki centar "VOICE"\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The \u201cHerrero\u201d, LLC, owned by Radovan Kova\u010d, continued to be awarded contracts related to hygiene maintenance at public procurements after Kova\u010d became the owner of the local media outlet \u201cInformativno-propagandni centar Kula\u201d (IPC Kula). 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