Since 8 August 2025, the Government has refused to implement the Regulation on media freedom, the protection of journalists and their sources, ownership transparency, and the ensuring of independence and financial sustainability of public media institutions.
The Federation of Culture and Mass-Media FAIR-MediaSind, the representative trade union organization for the Culture and Mass-Media sectors in Romania, sent today, 30 March 2026, to the leadership of the European Parliament and the European Commission a formal complaint regarding the failure of the Government led by Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan to comply with Regulation (EU) 2024/1083 establishing a common framework for media services in the internal market (European Media Freedom Act – EMFA).
Within this démarche, the Federation of Culture and Mass-Media FAIR-MediaSind requested the European Commission and the European Parliament:
to urgently assess Romania’s compliance with Regulation (EU) 2024/1083
to initiate the necessary institutional dialogue with the Romanian authorities
and, where appropriate, to trigger the infringement procedure pursuant to Article 258 TFEU
The Regulation entered into force on 8 August 2025 and is directly applicable in all Member States, pursuant to Article 288 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU). Despite the binding nature of this Regulation, the Romanian authorities have not adopted the necessary measures to ensure effective compliance with its provisions, in particular with regard to editorial independence, the protection of journalists’ sources, governance guarantees, sustainable funding and the operational autonomy of public media institutions.
At the same time, public media institutions in Romania – the Romanian Television Society (SRTv), the Romanian Radio Broadcasting Company (SRR) and the National News Agency AGERPRES – remain exposed to structural political influence, chronic underfunding and administrative measures that affect their capacity to fulfil their public service mission.
For example, the Board of Administration of the Romanian Television Society includes Cristina Pocora, recently appointed State Counsellor to the Prime Minister, and the Board of Administration of the Romanian Radio Broadcasting Company includes Ioana Ene Dogioiu, who currently holds the position of official spokesperson of Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan, who also holds the position of President of the National Liberal Party (PNL). This dual capacity of the President of the PNL generates major conflicts of interest that may affect the decision-making and editorial independence of the leadership of the two public media institutions. It is unacceptable in a rule of law state that the competent institutions do not take action ex officio in these blatant cases of undermining the independence of SRR and SRTv.
Hypocrisy, manipulation and denigration against TVR employees
As has been observed recently, the President and CEO of the Romanian Television, Adriana Ana Săftoiu, nominated to the Board of Administration by the same Prime Minister and party president, Ilie Bolojan, has, since taking office, launched an aggressive media offensive against the employees of the institution and against the professional and salary rights provided by the Collective Labour Agreement of the institution.
Displaying maximum hypocrisy, Adriana Săftoiu blames the provisions of the Collective Labour Agreement to justify her high salary received as President and CEO, although she was the one who refused the request of the representatives of the representative trade union, Romanian Trade Union of Journalists – MediaSind, to eliminate from the Collective Labour Agreement the coefficient provided for the salary of a minister. What the head of TVR avoids mentioning is that the provisions of the law on the organization and functioning of SRR and SRTv stipulate that remuneration is made at the level of a minister, that is, according to the annex of the salary law, a coefficient of 10.5 is applied to the minimum salary. (see photo)
Last but not least, Adriana Săftoiu, also using the vote delegated to her by the Prime Minister’s counsellor, recently managed to obtain, within the Board of Administration, the abolition of the TVR Folclor channel. This action represents a first step towards the dismantling of the national and cultural heritage of the public television, with dramatic consequences on the fulfilment of its public service mission. (details here: Desființarea TVR Folclor – primul pas spre distrugerea identității culturale și naționale a Televiziunii Române)
The transformation of TVR into an instrument of political propaganda is being pursued
Although Romania ranks last in Europe in terms of funding for public media institutions, Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan has publicly stated that the Romanian Television must lay off 10% of its staff in 2026, similar to other entities in the economy. (details here: https://tvrinfo.ro/guvernul-pregateste-concedieri-la-stat-bolojan-toate-institutiile-publice-trebuie-sa-si-faca-reducerea-de-personal-de-10/)
For example, in terms of the amount allocated per capita for public media services, Romania ranks last, as well as in terms of the number of employees, at 0.06% of GDP, compared to 0.21 Hungary, 0.10 Bulgaria, 0.22 Slovenia, 0.23 Austria, 0.26 Germany.
This governmental offensive, supported in the media by various political actors, will in fact lead to the dismantling of public media institutions and to their transformation into instruments of political propaganda. Such situations raise serious concerns regarding the institutional independence of public media and are incompatible with Articles 4 and 5 of the EMFA, which establish guarantees for editorial independence and the independent functioning of public media services.
These deviations do not affect only the employees of media institutions, but every Romanian citizen, who risks receiving distorted, politically controlled information instead of a balanced and credible public service.
The FAIR-MediaSind Federation requests the Government of Romania and Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan to immediately comply with EMFA, to ensure predictable funding and to cease pressures on workers in public or privately-owned media.
We will not accept the transformation of the Romanian Television, the Public Radio and the National News Agency AGERPRES into political instruments, to be used by those who temporarily lead the destiny of this country.
We express our solidarity with all professionals in public media, who carry out their activity under pressure, uncertainty and chaos.
We will keep you informed about the developments of this démarche.
Communication Department
FAIR-MediaSind Federation
Bucharest, 30 March 2026
