The new Rai CEO appointed by Italy's
rightwing government on Thursday implictly denied there had been
a righting takeover of the state broadcaster after two top
left-leaning talk show host's exit, stressing the need for a
non-ideological approach and saying the public broadcaster was
not in the gift of anyone.
Rai appointments regularly change hands in Italy's spoils system
and Premier Giorgia Meloni's government has denied a purge but
the PM has said she wants to end the "power system" of the left.
Sergio said Thursday the approach of the new management "is
everything but ideological" and said "Rai cannot be in the gift
of a few people".
Sergio was speaking to the parliamentary Rai oversight
commission, which is currently assessing whether Rai's coverage
of a local-election-eve rally by Meloni in Catania ahead of a
big nationwide win by the right last month broke rules on equal
time in electoral campaign coverage.
The premier's rally for the centre-right mayoral candidate in
the run-off was fully covered live by Rai's rolling news channel
RaiNews24.
Italy has so-called 'par condicio' rules governing fair and
equal coverage of political parties.
In the rally, Meloni took aim at critics of the government's
alleged takeover of key positions at Rai in the well-established
post-electoral practice saying that she was aiming not to
demolish a leftwing cultural hegemony but a leftwing system of
power.
Amid appointments of government people in top spots, Rai has
lost the two popular left-leaning chat show hosts, Fabio Fazio
and Lucia Annunziata, a former Rai chair, amid an alleged purge
which the government denies.
Fazio, whose show was not renewed and who is moving to Discovery
Channel, said In mid-May the failure of Rai to renew the
contract for his historic talk show was a sign of the "boundless
greed" of the new government in the alleged putsch.
In his weekly column for Oggi, Fazio said the right felt
"legitimised" by its thumping September general election win "to
behave like the owner of the public sphere with little regard
for the public weal and with a boundless greed".
Former Rai president and veteran journalist Annunziata quit Rai
complaining about government meddling.
Her "irrevocable" decision came shortly after the board of
directors headed by newly appointed CEO Sergio - named
after his predecessor Carlo Fuortes quit citing government
pressure - approved a new round of appointments for the
network's top news posts, including making Gian Marco Chiocci
the head of Tg1 news on the flagship Rai1 channel and Antonio
Preziosi the head of Tg2 on Rai2.
Annunziata currently hosts the popular talk show In Mezz'ora (In
half an hour) on historically left-leaning Rai 3, in which she
grills politicians on current affairs.
"I have come to this decision because I do not agree with
anything about the actions of the current government, neither
the content, nor the method," Annunziata said in a letter to the
new Rai management.
"In particular, I don't agree with the way of intervening in
Rai".
Government parties have however pointed out that the left placed
its own people in positions of power on many, but not all,
occasions in the past after winning elections.
Oversight committee chair Barbara Floridia of the opposition
5-Star Movement (M5S) said her panel will "evaluate with extreme
attention" allegations by the centre-left opposition Democratic
Party (PD) and M5S, which claimed there had been "a very serious
violation of par condicio" for the live broadcast on RaiNews24
of the rally organised by the centre right in Catania.
At the rally, Meloni said she wanted to "free Rai from an
intolerant system of power.
"If someone in Rai has to measure himself with merit and decides
he cannot do it and has to measure himself with something else,
it is not a problem we can pose to ourselves," she added.
Appointments to the State broadcaster have always been heavily
influenced by the line of the government of the day, with the
exception of Rai 3 which has retained its identity as a
left-leaning channel.
In his report to the panel Thursday, Sergio added that there is
a high risk of evasion if the current method of collecting the
license fee for state broadcaster Rai via electricity bills is
changed.
The TV licence fee in Italy is the lowest among the main
European countries, he told the parliamentary Rai oversight
body.
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