Hope for independent media in Serbia

After the student movement's election victory, hope for independent media in Serbia As of: October 29, 2026 • 7:46 a.m

After the defeat of the Vucic party in Serbia, many people are hoping for independent reporting again. One initiative calls for the revocation of the broadcasting license for Informer - a propaganda station serving the ex-president.

Ivana Stevanovic and Norbert Sinkovic stand on Nikola Pašić Square in Belgrade and hold a paper up to the cameras of waiting journalists. The two have just submitted an initiative to the Serbian Electronic Media Regulatory Authority.

“We have applied to initiate the procedure to revoke the broadcasting license for the Informer television station,” says Stevanovic. She works for a foundation that promotes media freedom in Serbia. The foundation and more than 30 other organizations and individuals have joined the action against whistleblowers.

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The television station Informer has been broadcasting hate speech for years, targeting people, publishing personal data, and showing intimate photos of participants in the student protests, says Stevanovic. "A broadcaster that not only committed violations of the Electronic Media Act, but also committed criminal offenses in its program - and all of this in the interests of a political party."

The Informer channel is considered the worst propaganda tool in the service of long-time President Aleksandar Vucic. The station's editor-in-chief is Dragan Vucicevic. He is known for his foul-mouthed tirades against members of the opposition. Vucicevic insulted the rector of the University of Belgrade, Vladan Djokic, who is active in the student movement, with a series of homophobic expletives and called him “human scum.”

Vucicevic made himself unpopular with such statements. On Monday evening, a few dozen people broke into the Informer studios and humiliated the station boss. Representatives of the student movement distanced themselves from the action, such as Ilija Srdanovic, who headed the electoral list. “We ask you to remain as calm and dignified as before until the end of the electoral process and beyond.” And: “Do not resort to any form of violence.”

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The initiative around Stevanovic also does not support the approach. She calls for an institutional response to blatant violations in the reporting of many media outlets. Because Informer is by no means the only broadcaster that spreads falsehoods and slander. In recent years, almost all media in Serbia have come directly or indirectly under the influence of the previous ruler Vucic - for example through state subsidies or advertising money from public companies.

Norbert Sinkovic, media scientist at the University of Novi Sad, hopes that this era will now end. There are cases at a local and also a national level - media that work as propaganda broadcasters. "These channels should be closely monitored. We know that the regulator has reports. Now it's time for them to get to work."

Political scientist Aleksandra Tomanic from the German Southeast European Society believes that the Serbian media supervision - like many other institutions - has failed in recent years: "For over a decade, all of these systems and institutions were put at the service of a party. Now rebuilding and professionalizing that will be a mammoth task."

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In some editorial offices, however, something is already happening even without institutional intervention. On the state broadcaster RTV, news presenter Goran Eror apologized to the audience:

An apology is probably not to be expected from Informer. It is still unclear whether the broadcaster will pay for this by revoking its license. The media regulator announced that it would examine the complaints.

This topic in the program: tagesschau.de | Serbia: What next with the media? | Oct 29, 2026 | 07:27 am