“The situation with disinformation and propaganda in our country is terrible, very bad”, says journalist Zoran Ivanov in an interview for CIVIL Media.
“I also judge by the reactions of citizens in open contact programs. They react to something that is unproven, unconfirmed. Asking myself where the sources of producing untruths, fake news, propaganda are located, for here, in our Macedonian small space, I can conclude (with the right to be wrong) that the biggest generators for placing fake news, false information and a kind of political and party propaganda are precisely the headquarters of the political parties, as it can be seen from the information that is put out in the public from their press conferences and statements, that it is prepared and packaged “, said Ivanov.
He is concerned that the institutions, judicial bodies and even Prosecutor’s Office do not react to false campaigns and accusations.
“Here in the latest examples, the opposition party had two campaigns that lasted two-three days. They don’t even have evidence. Something else worries me. That is the fact that neither the institutions, judicial bodies, or the Prosecutor’s Office react to such accusations. If it’s about crimes, dishonest acquisition of property, about accusations of millions of euros that someone has made an abuse, it ends with statements of the spokespersons or with a press conference of a party leader. In that sense, we are an atrophied information society”, said Ivanov.
As to the question who is responsible and what is needed to overcome the challenges we are facing, and that are brought by disinformation and propaganda, he stressed that responsibility lies with the media and editorial offices.
“Journalism is responsible – the media, primarily the editorial offices of the most influential media, of the established media, of the mainstream media, but also of the new portals who stick to themselves. They are the main link in society for unmasking fake news, above all, for unmasking the sources of fake news, because the citizens and I, as consumers who generally inform ourselves by reading headlines, don’t get into the topics and content and take everything for granted”, says Ivanov.
The editorial offices should request additional information, the journalists should investigate, but the appropriate institutions also need to react, underlines Ivanov.
“It is the responsibility of the editorial offices to ask for every information for which there are indications or they suspect that there is no evidence, that it is hanging in the air, that it is a purely political or party accusation, that they need to seek additional information and investigate, to ask in the institutions and so on. But the very institutions need to react to accusations of such major crimes or deviations in society. It means that we are a society and state practically with atrophied institutions, and with that qualification, unfortunately, I will say something also about the Macedonian journalism, about the many fake profiles, I am pardoning this time and in this occasion the social networks because there we participate as citizens wanting to write something, but that is why there are citizens and there are institutions”, stressed Ivanov.
Biljana Jordanovska
Prepared by: Ј. Gjorgjioski
camera: Aleksandar Rizinski
editing: Arian Mehmeti
translation: N. Cvetkovska
The interview is part of the project “Resilient journalism in countering disinformation and propaganda”, which CIVIL is implementing in partnership with Youth4Media (Y4M), with the support of the Government of North Rhine-Westphalia, Dusseldorf, Germany.
