site.btaRegulator Adopts National Radio Director's Six-Month Report

The Council for Electronic Media (CEM) adopted Bulgarian National Radio (BNR) Director General Milen Mitev's report for the six months from November 1, 2023, until April 30, 2024.

Presenting his report, Mitev said BNR has retained its share of one-third of total radio listening time in Bulgaria. About 110,000 people listen to a BNR service at any given moment, he said.

"To make our website more accessible, a large part of our news content is read out by artificial intelligence, which has become so popular lately. It is our first attempt to use AI software in our media services," Mitev said.

Three CEM members, Galina Georgieva, Sonya Momchilova and the acting Chairperson Gabriela Naplatanova, voted in favour of Mitev's report. Prolet Velkova and Simona Veleva voted against.

Prolet Velkova said her reasons to vote against the report had to do with Petar Volgin's talk show Politically INcorrect. After Volgin was elected to the European Parliament on June 9, Silvia Velikova remained the only host of the show.

Prolet Velkova said: "During the reporting period and in earlier periods and years, there was a recurrent problem in the public radio: a lack of pluralism in one of the configurations of the show Politically INcorrect. Political propaganda was carried out through that programme, which was unfair to the other candidates in the respective elections, and it was unfair to the listeners too."

The journalistic standards observed on Politically INcorrect were questioned by the BNR Programming Board in December 2023, when they took down Petar Volgin's interview with Russian Ambassador Eleonora Mitrofanova.

Simona Veleva noted during Thursday's discussion that, according to Mitev's report, expenditures amounted to BGN 34,829,979. Veleva said she would not back the report because it does not give details about how this budget was distributed.