Top Court Clears Way For New RTVSLO Law. Kind Of.

The Constitutional Court on Friday lifted the stay of execution of the new RTVSLO legislation. Thus it put out the flaming bag of dogshit it created with the February decision. As a result, despite the court not yet ruling on the substance of the complaint, new RTVSLO management and oversight bodies can take over. They can then finally stop the political clown-car that has been running the public broadcaster into the ground for the last eighteen months.

The Boy with the flute, the RTVSLO symbol, superimposed on a Constitutional Court plaque, combined with a green traffic light.
Constitutional Court green-lit new RTVSLO legislation (picture by Capt. Obvious)

That said, the Court also ended up with quite an egg on it face. Mostly for reasons pengovsky pointed out back in February. The court desperately tried to avoid a political fallout. Yet it achieved exactly the opposite and cooked up a clusterfuck of epic proportions in the process. Among other things, it allowed dismantling of RTVSLO to continue unabated, thus failing its own “lesser or two evils” test. It also rendered itself inoperative on this issue. Which is why the top judicial body had to resort to some pretty messy lawyering to sort out this shit out. Kind of.

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New RTVSLO Legislation Hits A Snag

With only a week until it was to fully come into effect, the constitutional court today stayed the execution of several articles of the new law on RTVSLO. This is the first semi-success the remains of the Janša regime scored on this front. And even so, it was as much by sheer dumb luck as it was by carefully laid out legal arguments.

Constitutional court and RTVSLO mascot.

Both readers will remember that voters in Muddy Hollows approved the new law in a November referendum. As a result, the SDS shills currently turning RTVSLO into an unwatchable shitshow, nearly ran out of options. The law was on the books and the clock was ticking for selection of the new board and management. So they tried an everything-but-the-kitchen-sink type of a constitutional complaint. And lo-behold!, something actually stuck. But go easy on the champagne, this is all much more fucktangular than it looks.

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Once More Unto The Referendum Breach, Dear Friends

Apologies for abusing The Bard, but the upcoming referendum votes do have a tinge of Shakespearean drama to it. Or maybe it is the Shakespearean length of this post. Who knows. To quote Hamlet, fuck it. Going to the polls for the third time in as many weeks, and for the fifth time in eight months, is not a regular occurrence in Muddy Hollows.

Shepherd boy with flute symbolises RTVSLO. The fate of the public broadcaster in Slovenia will be determined on a referendum on Sunday.
Shepherd boy with flute, by Zdenko Kalin, symbolising RTVSLO since forever. But for how long? (source)

And yet, this Sunday might prove to be just as crucial as the April parliamentary election was. For those of you living under a rock for the past few months, Slovenians are about vote in three different referendums on Sunday. There is a vote in the Government Act, on the law on elderly care, and the law on RTVSLO, the public broadcaster. A fucking cornucopia of direct democracy if there ever was one. But there is a catch. Because of course there is.

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Apr`es Moi, Le Déluge

News broke this afternoon that Studio City, the iconic RTVSLO programme, long a thorn in the side of soon-to-be-ex PM Janez Janša and his cronies, is to have its host Marcel Štefančič, jr. axed and its format radically altered. This, obviously, was not entirely unexpected.

Marcel Štefančič, host of Studio City, circa 2013.
Studio City and its host Marcel Štefančič, jr., circa 2013 (photo by yours truly)

All the evidence pointed to something like this. Not in the least because the outgoing regime and its recently-installed peons at RTVSLO spent the last couple of months dismantling every single bit of programming that dared look at the government with a critical eye. Studio City was right at the top of that list. However, that it should be done on 3 May, the World Press Freedom Day, is – not to be too direct – sadistic.

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The Siege Of RTVSLO

It may, of course, be pure coincidence, but fact of the matter is that only days into Russian aggression against Ukraine, the government of Slovenian PM Janez Janša began a siege and ultimately an assault on RTV Slovenija (RTVSLO), the country’s public broadcaster.

The building of TV arm of RTV Slovenija (RTVSLO), the nation's public broadcaster.
RTVSLO headquarters (source)

Normally, putting the war in Ukraine and the shit Janša is getting away with side by side would be gratuitous at best. But it is not only that there is a temporal overlap between the two. The Glorious Leader is directly using RTVSLO coverage of war in Ukraine to instigate the latest and most brutal round of undermining and destruction of the public outlet.

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