Studio 99 was one of the first media which started the term of independent
radio journalism and things connected to that term. At first just
a radio station, Studio 99 has developed during its evolution into a media
system which is becoming more and more significant in Bosnian information
space. We spoke to Adil Kulenovic, studio director, about the genesis
of Studio 99 and things that followed its further development.
" Independent radio Studio 99 started to work four months before the
war and at that time we were convinced that we should be just a commercial
station which would play good music and commercials.
Of course, as a commercial station we did not plan to do information
program, especially not about politics. At that time we also published
a magazine Slobodna Bosna, which was politicaly engaged and we thought
, if we have one media like that, another one should not be like that
. But, four months after the founding, the war came and other decisions had to
be made. At the very first beginning of the war, many media were shut
off, but Studio 99 editorial staff decided that, no matter what the circumstances
would be, we will have the same destiny as other citizens. We are the
only radio station which managed to makeit through the entire war, with
the exception of the state radio. The basic orientation, founded then
, at the beginning of the war, meant that we work for all citizens, regardlessof
their nationality, sex or religion. We were aware of the fact that this
orientation is not the choice of ideology, choice of life and options
of survival in this area. Because, at the time, Studio 99 could, as
we supported the first peace manifestation in front of the Holiday Inn
on April 6, 1992, where there were around 100 000 people,
cause another
night of Bartholomey here, in a sense to conduct international differenciation
in Sarajevo based on religious, national or any other principle.
Radio 99 worked for people of Sarajevo and so does today and, as long as we are able to work on these principles, we will keep on existing. Thanks to our persistance in our beliefs, we survived all the crises
we had during the war period, beginning with starvation and life danger
, to what was expressed in all sorts of the extreme. During the first
year of war, Studio 99 gave people hope that normal life is possible and
we were supported by most people. Also, we did not have any special internal
problems,
except for those that happen in every war, besides the fact that we
were the first radio station occupied by illegal military formations of
the time.
About the problems that followed the work of Studio 99, Mr. Kulenovic says :
" During the second war year we had our first problems and they were always about Studio 99’s orientation for civil and multiethnic Bosnia and Herzegovina and also the orientation that points out civil rights and as the first principle. The moment when nationalistic tendencies grew,it meant our first confrontation with forces that were in favor of ethnic division of BiH and they were trying to shut down Studio 99. The first confrontation happened in July,1993 when we managed to get the new transmitter,thanks to journalists from the French organization "The Right to Word". Another problem,more serious one, happened in September, 1995 when our radio-tv transmitter was set on fire,also by local politic extrem forces which, at that moment,thought that basic idea of Studio 99-democratic and multiethnic BiH- was something opposite to their intentionof dividing Bosnia. Thanks to UNESCO support, we continued to work 27 days later."
From a small radio station, Studio 99 has developed into the media whose activities included founding of television.
"Television started to work on February 1, 1995, planning to continue
providing objective information, through TV, as a dominant media. The early
period meant working in circumstances of fighting local authorities in
order to keep our independence, on a clear program orientation. But, this
struggle brought drastic crises, but time had shown that man has as much
liberty as he can take into his own hands. If we had waited for someone
to bring us freedom, we would never have seen it. Media freedom can not be
created when someone makes conditions for it. A journalist must be aware
of the holliness of his profession and he must be brave so he would not
harm people and harm is done with lies. With arrival of peace new problems
occured. We faced ourselves with maintainance of independence in context
of international authorities. Politicians always want to instrumentalize
media, and put them in function of their political ambitions. That was the
main reason why Studio 99, which was the main creator of
independent TV network OBN, left OBN after 12 days of the project. We left
it because some centers of political power through OHR, tried to turn Studio
99 in propaganda instrument. In 12 days of broadcasting we could not show
one minute of our own program, and we had an ultimatum that we can not broadcast
our programin time period from 18:00 to 24:00 hours. That was out of the
question for us. They insisted that we should not broadcast our program
but only theirs. What sort of independence is it than? After we left OBN, Studio
99 was media isolated for year and a half of all organizations except UNESCO.That
is not a rich organization, but moral support was enough for us."
To our remark that most domestic media depend on foreign donations
and the queston about the future of such work, we got the following answer:
"I am sure that OBN network will go down, the minute the foreign
capital is gone. Media that survived on its own work, without international
help, is Studio 99. Last year, in six month perod, we had average pay 85 DM
per month. We had to go through a shock of market adjusting and remainance
as selfstanding project, by ourselves. In the next six months our salaries
grew to 250 DM. That forced us to adjust to new circumstances and new conditions, and
"instead of letting someone else give us the fish, we learned how to fish
independently."That is why we survived as selfstanding project. Last year
in May, I was in a terrible dilemma if we should close down Studio 99 because
our debts went beyond the figure I could psychologically stand. I was in
dilemma if we should stop working, but we went on and ended up as one of
the few Bosnian media that managed to pay salaries to their employees last
year. At this moment, Studio 99 has no debts, no financial donations in scence
of getting money for salaries or the new technical equipment. We have no
help from political parties or foreign media organizations. Our crisis is
based on the fact that we live on a market, and OBN on donations.They can
pay ten times bigger salaries then we can earn. We must make our money on
advertisement and be competition to OBN at the same time with much less
possibilities. Financies are limiting factor for us and we can make as much
progress as our financies allow us to. In order to have commercials, we need
to work more and do more quality shows, so this is an obstacle we are trying
to overcome. For the first time in history of Studio 99 we are involved
in an investment based on our financies, but it will be helped by European
Community. It is about building a new transmitter on location that can cover
all central Bosnia, investment is about 670 000 DM and until now with our
business arangements, through advertising or renting media space,we managed
to insure realization of this project. The European Community, for the first
time after year and a half, decided to donate 20 000 ecu's to Studio 99 that
will only be used for getting new technique, new transmitter and new cameras. We
asked UNESCO and they agreed to control the ways of spending donations. With the new transmitter we will get 200 000 new direct viewers and around
500 000 listeners. We hope to get the possibility of better connecting to
local TV stations. At this moment our central information show "Oko 22"
is directly broadcasted by TV Visoko, and we hope we will make opportunity
for other TV stations to show our programs."
We were also interested in how much did the technical imperfection disturb
the complete realization of the planned program and how much will the program
improve after getting the new equipment. The answer is:
" This technical help will be very helpful. From total 670 000 DM investment
,around 100 000 DM will be used for technical linking of Studio 99 equipment. Our
equipment is used to a maximum and it is very burdened, so a lot of technical
details that provide normal function are missing. After this equipment arrives
we will have shows of best quality. Other shows will also develop depending
on getting new equipment, if we manage to get financies to cover them. If
we make additional commercial shows from which Studio 99 could get money
for expenses and salaries, it would be ideal. At this time, when I tell a
foreigner how much one minute of our program costs, he usually laughs, but
it is the reality. On the other hand, in the new law about frequencies would
be the law that puts all of us in the same position. Right now we could
say that authorities act on authority-logic principle, and they are trying
to insure absolute domination of media they controle. Unfortunatelly, according
tothe law proposals, it is obvious that using strategy of making the state
mediastrong they will at the same time annul every presumption for survival
of the independent media."
About the superiority of the state media, Kulenovic adds this:
"The law does not limit big media with commercials, but it makes it possible for them to get incomes they want on bases of commercials and at the same time, the budget settles the rest of their obligations, so Studio 99 requests the state to limit the number of commercials for the big media, so they would have to buy around 25% of programs from the independent media. I hope that the associatoin we made, TV POOL, would help us to come forward with unique amandmans that will ask for the same rights for state and independent media."
What is the cooperation like between Studio 99 and other media in Bosnia and Herzegovina ?
"When I was creating the OBN idea, I believed that independent
media should be connected to each other and keep developing on the count
of that connection. Now we wish to cooperate with all open media, not only
independent ones, and in realization of that project we formed TV POOL which
is made of televisions: Gorazde, Visoko, Zenica, 99, Bugojno, Travnik,Tesanj
Tuzla and Bihac. As far as Republika
Srpska is concerned, we are in touch with TV from Rudo and we will
try to cooperate with them. We are also in touch with SKY SAT, TV from Montenegro, with
which we are planning to make a gathering of independent journalists from
Mediteranian countries."
About the future of independent media, he said:
"I believe, if we could survive worst war circumstances, future
is on our side and no matter how long the struggle for freedom and democratization
of Bosnia and Herzegovina should last, I hope it will be seen how much life
is stronger than death."