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Broadcasting Chief Threatens Debtors with Advertising Blackout
Thursday, February 21, 2002
Gazeta.Ru

That sounds like an extremely effective plan to make the debtor channel pay off their debts to the RTRS: to take those channel's off air, not altogether, but only during advertising slots. Sklyar said that instead a message would appear reading "advertising should be here." He claimed that such a course of action would even be to the viewers' advantage, for he claims 99% of Russian viewers don't pay attention to advertising in any case.

The General director of Russian Television and Radio Broadcasting Networks, Gennady Sklyar, has for the first time spoken publicly about the problems facing the state broadcasting enterprise formed last August. He named the reconstruction of Moscow's Ostankino TV tower, unpaid debts by state controlled channels, and relations with the press and communications among the major problems facing his entity.

The State Unitary Enterprise of Russian Television and Radio Broadcasting Network (RTRS) was established under a decree issued by President Putin last August with the aim of turning Russia's television and radio broadcasting infrastructure into a financially independent entity capable of attracting investment.

The infrastructure that the RTRS inherited from the Ministry of Communications is severely dilapidated. There are approximately 100 television towers in Russia, almost all of which are in a poor state of repair and require substantial renovation. The devastating fire in Moscow's Ostankino TV tower in August 1999 and the poor progress of the restoration works highlights the sorry state of the country's broadcasting facilities.

At the time of the fire the broadcasting network was under the control of the All Russian State Television and Radio Broadcasting Corporation (VRTRC), which controls various state television channels and radio stations. Soon after the Ostankino fire Putin accused the VRTRC of bad management and briefly transferred the network back to the communications ministry before the RTRS was established.

According to Gennady Sklyar the RTRS inherited a debt of 500 million rubles to the electricity grid and a "failed investment programme" from the VRTRC.
(More: Gazeta.Ru News Source)
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Dan