The country’s information space is comparable to its resources. Perhaps it is not yet clear to everyone

In September Kyiv is hosting the 64th World Newspaper Congress. Simultaneously the 19th World Editors Forum will be held, where the leaders of the world’s biggest editions will convene, among them such giants of the newspaper world as The Times and The Washington Post. The organizers of the event expect the arrival of nearly 1,000 managers of printed media businesses from more than 80 countries.

The chief masterminds of the event is the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers, which unites over 18,000 newspapers and magazines, 15,000 online editions, and more than 3,000 companies worldwide. In Kyiv, the international participants will be welcomed by the Ukrainian Association of Press Publishers (UAPP).

At the end of February The Day was receiving Oleksii POHORELOV, CEO of the UAPP. Of course, the oncoming congress was one of the main topics. The conversation began with the problem of speculations around the freedom of speech – the subject was casually brought up by Pohorelov himself.

What did you mean when you mentioned speculations around the freedom of speech? We can see that Ukraine has indeed sunk in all the ratings evaluating freedom of speech. What kind of speculations are these?

“Personally I am of the opinion that encroachment of freedom of speech is a fait accompli, and it has to be opposed. Here belong, for instance, the Constitution Court’s decision ruling out spreading information about politicians’ relatives, the draft Law of Ukraine “On the Protection of Public Morals,” or the attempts to impose a censorship on the Internet. But on the other hand, there are also attempts to pass someone’s own lack of professionalism, corruption, sloth, and corporate conflicts. Unfortunately, speculations are often blown up into scandals on international scale, which builds a negative image of entire Ukrainian media environment: all consultancies react first of all to the published instances of infringement of freedom of press.”

THIS COUNTRY HAS NOT HAD INFORMATION POLICY SINCE COMMUNIST TIME

Do you remember Olena Hetmanchuk’s celebrated article in The New York Times/International Herald Tribune, published shortly after Tymoshenko’s arrest? The message was, that it was something other than the battle between “good” and “evil.” Well, the Western world wants to see the whole story exactly as the battle between good and evil, and will not realize that the war is going on much deeper. Do you think Ukrainian journalism helps the world realize what is really going on in Ukraine?

“The main thing that matters is what language we send information abroad in. Suffice it to recollect the recent story with stray dogs, which was making news for some two months everywhere in Europe: ‘Ukrainians are cruel, brutal beasts.’ Is that true? No, it is just a cheap sensation, which was carried on by the media – because sad as it is, bad news sells fast. Do Western journalists know where they can at least verify the information on this issue? Voila!

“No matter if this information will be published or not, but major European media must get official news from Ukraine in English. This is a matter of information policy which (and we must admit it) this country has not had since the communist time, under any of our presidents.”

Some think that in terms of value, the country’s information space is comparable to its resources. Does anyone in government understand the danger of a “messy” information field?

“The information field is indeed a matter of national security. And the financial crisis, too, should have taught a good lesson: information spreads way too fast to make it possible to keep things under control. These threats are only aggravated by the progress of the Internet, mass media, and social networks.

“Therefore, I am constantly trying to draw the attention of those in charge of information policy to the fact that for Ukraine the risks are too high, but they are neglected.”

If government is incapable or unwilling to see and realize these threats, then maybe it is the journalists who must speak out? The problem of quality must be the key issue for Ukrainian journalism. How can this quality be improved? Do you know a recipe?

“It is necessary to promote the development of independent, quality journalism. Media should not be prohibited to earn this much, or publish these advertisements – no, it is necessary to stimulate the development of quality media. By the way, this is what will make the population more intelligent and the nation, wealthier.

“Besides, there is another aspect to the problem. Does Ukraine have a school of editors, who are able to pass on their expertise, skills, vision, and have the courage to train journalism students into professional journalists?”

The Day does this.

“You are doing a great job! And you are not alone: there are many other good examples of Ukrainian press publishers, which have a systemic approach to this problem, improve the quality of their materials, and help their readers to improve their standards of living. But unfortunately, the country does not know its heroes.

“And do we have a post-university further education for an individual who wants to take up journalism professionally – after earning a degree in a different field? Someone said that today more than a half of Ukrainian journalists have no professional training. My 15-year experience allows me to confirm this fact. Moreover, I would even go further and say that in business and economic journalism there are very few professional journalists.

“So I would like to give credit to all outstanding representatives of the field, true professionals, who work hard to cultivate our information field every day, to make it better, richer, and more professional.”

WE ARE NOT YET USED TO WORKING ON SOLUTIONS IN A DEMOCRATIC WAY

How would you describe the state of Ukraine’s information space today?

“The situation is very unequal. There are a lot of professional editions, The Day among them. But there are others, who merely sell their pages to bold-facedly publish sponsored materials. At the present-day state in the development of mass media, when the Internet puts news literally at your fingertips, while paper is getting more and more expensive, newspapers switch from offering news to offering analysis. Weeklies are proliferating, whereas dailies are gradually becoming less numerous now.

“The World Newspaper Congress and the World Editors Forum, scheduled to be held in Kyiv this fall, will be an excellent opportunity to show both our mass media and our country. Despite the Ukrainian media industry having experienced one of the worst economic situations in the world, our mass media have weathered the storm and gained unique survival experience. This does us credit and proves Ukrainian media managers’ outstanding abilities to do business and professionally build long-lasting and solid relations with their audiences and advertisers.

“Therefore, now we are working hard in order to make it clear that there is no point in trying to link the Congress in September to the parliamentary election. The World Congress is the largest and most influential worldwide gathering of top-level professionals in the news business.”

But they are going to be linked, anyway, since the Congress is supposed to be supervised by the head of the president’s administration. However, the media environment must make the best possible use of the event, to attain their own object. What is your opinion of it all?

“The 64th World Newspaper Congress and the 19th World Editors Forum are both organized by the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA), of which the UAPP is a member. Even before the decision to hold the forum in Ukraine was taken, the UAPP had sent an official letter of application to the WAN-IFRA leadership and proposed to hold the congress in Kyiv. Another similar invitation the WAN-IFRA management got from the president of Ukraine.

“After Ukraine had won the right to host the congress and editors forum in a competition with four other countries, a working group for the promotion of both the congress and the editors forum was created. There are a lot of problems that need to be solved on the top governmental level. So it is only natural that such working group should be led by the head of the Presidential Administration. It has nothing to do with defining the contents of the congress, for which WAN-IFRA is totally responsible.

“Now, how can the media use this unique opportunity? Both the congress and the working group are good platforms to let anyone directly involved in their work better understand the peculiarity of each other’s work. And since media-related legislation has recently been rotating mostly around bans (on pretext of protecting various strata of the population), I hope that we will manage to explain that free and quality media are impossible if advertising is banned.”

But what about Ukraine’s ranking first in Europe in terms of teenage beer alcoholism?

“Is advertising to blame for that? If the parents drink beer, banning the ads will not repel their children from doing the same. To uproot the problem, we must tackle its true causes. This is a laborious task, which has to be done on a large scale, via promoting healthy contents in the media, via a sensible social program, the improvement of sports facilities, the promotion of a healthy lifestyle, or building bicycle paths.

“Our country has one more problem, alongside with others: the problem of populism, a misperception of cause-effect relations. During the congress we will try to show the mechanism of decision-making in the present-day world.

“The congress will also include a ‘Ukrainian section.’ Jointly with our publishers, international experts, and Ukrainian decision-makers we are going to discuss a couple of major publishing problems in Ukraine, and we will do our best to shape our communication into a concrete solution.”

Cheese wars, gas wars – do you think Ukrainian journalism is prepared to meet all of these challenges? By the way, the other day we were debating at our office if Ukrainian journalists should wish their own government a defeat in the information war.

“No, they may not. We have to live in this country. Before you start doing something, every time you have to ask yourself: Is it going to help my nation, society, is it going to promote national business, is it going to instill the feeling of solidarity? One of the key missions of journalism is speaking the truth, as well as helping its readers unite around important things and shape the public opinion concerning the most important issues for the nation. Unfortunately, only a few have so far preached such approaches. But someone intelligent has to break trail one day.

“By the way, the government justly criticizes the media: okay, you defended advertising medicine, however, with one reservation: a correct attitude towards a healthy lifestyle should be shaped. But where are your articles on the subject? Do many media tell about sponsors who restore or build new sports grounds all over the country? Do we typically see a lot of articles about successful solutions, where someone’s positive experience is analyzed in terms of its usefulness for others?

“Of course, there are similar publications. But the negative materials outweigh them by far. This creates an extremely negative, depressing background, whereas it should inspire.”

SOCIETY IS CHANGING

There are plenty of topics which used to make headlines, but as time passed, they blended in the background, and journalists let them drop. And nowadays young talents like Ksenia Vasylenko say things like “Who needs Gongadze case now? This is history…” It is utterly cynical, and it is said by the young generation. Why?

“I guess this must be mere envy and perhaps the reluctance to leave the comfort zone. It is so much easier to just drift and remain inconspicuous. Non-standard acts take a broad perspective and professional certainty. In any country the percentage of such individuals is pretty low, around 5-7 percent.”

How can one broaden the perspective?

“By learning from the best ones, or at least merely imitate them. By practicing and polishing your skills, reading books, and setting yourself higher goals all the time.”

Quick money has left its impact on everything. No one wants to work on long-term programs. However, there sometimes are hopeful incidents. There was a time when the slogan “Be bad, and you will do good!” was in great demand. Now everything is different. Certain figures helped here, but also time played a role.

“Society is changing, indeed, and time cures all and puts everything in place. So everyone, and not only journalists, should look for better role models in real life and be able to see what needs to get done if we want to make at least a tiny step ahead. Slowly, but steadily the world can be altered. Where there is a will, there is a way!”