Armenia’s First Lady, editor-in-chief of one of the leading news outlets of Armenia (country rank № 103), Anna Hakobyan touched upon the issues of Armenian media during the Pan-Armenian Conference on Armenian Media in Beirut. As one of the most important issues, she once again mentioned the issue of media financing and financing transparency.
The issue of media transparency for the New Armenia remains as idee fix, and this circumstance is justified by the fact that many political forces, oligarchs and foreign agents often provide financial support to the media and such press agencies publish news and comments which are not based on the interests of the people, but on the will of these agents and oligarchs.
Of course, there are also media outlets expressing people’s wishes and desires. 20-25% of the new authorities are former journalists, probably from such public newspapers.
Mrs. Hakobyan proposes subscribing as an option for the solution to the financing issue. We believe that it will not only somehow hinder the dissemination of important information, but also because of the low paying capacity of the population, it will not essentially solve the press problems.
As a successful option of media outlets financing, one can observe the experience that has already accumulated healthy, public media. It is necessary to create a charitable foundation linked to every media outlet, where citizens will make voluntary contributions, thus the media will become more public, more democratic.
In this case, one should not avoid the criminal money, laundering from the state budget because, as Mrs. Anna Hakobyan has repeatedly stated, in this case the important thing is that these money will serve a good purpose. Oligarchs can also invest in the funds, who by the way, can already be considered as just an owners, who in fact are the bases of the prosperity of our economy. Funding by foreign agents can be called “anonymous”, that is to say incognito donation is a completely acceptable form in the New Armenia Funds.
Aghasi Yenokyan
