In Sumy, journalist went on hunger strike, because of mayor’s refuse to finance radio

Acting as editor in chief of the local radio station in Lebedyn (Sumy region), Nataliya Panchenko went on hunger strike, as she reported it on Facebook. The journalist said she “could not work with such a despot, as the serving mayor is." Nataliya Panchenko told that the Mayor of Lebedin Alexander Baklykov refused to finance the radio station (Labedynsky municipal council is one its co-founders). As the official of the National Council in the Sumy region, Larysa Yakubenko confirmed on Facebook and told it IMI correspondent in the Sumy region, Natalia Panchenko went on hunger strike due to unwillingness of the municipal council to provide funds to support the evolution of the radio station and to pay off its license fee. The deadline for payment of the license fee expired on May 18th, the editorial board, in compliance to the law, had to enter an urgent payment in order not to lose the license. Therefore, Nataliya Panchenko transferred the amount of 16 588 hryvnias ($ 629) from the editorial office’s account, expecting that on May 17th the municipal council at its session will consider the issue and will increase the funds for the radio station through the program of Project of coverage of the local authorities and self-government bodies. However, this issue has not been put on the agenda. Mayor of the Lebedyn Alexander Baklykov explained that he did not see any sense in increasing of funding, since the editorial board of the radio station spent only about UAH 8,000 ($303) out of 46 thousand UAH ($1 746) of its budget. In addition, as to the mayor, the editor-in-chief failed to provide cost sheet relative to the project of evolution of the radio station. The mayor of Lebedyn has as well some claims as to the quality of the radio station news production. We remind, on April 18th, the National Council of Ukraine on Television and Radio Broadcasting announced the Lebedyn editorial board of the interdistrict radio broadcasting “Svitanok” winner for the Frequency of 91.8 MHz. By the terms of the competition it had been supposed the radio had to retransmit public broadcaster. Its own production had to be up to 4 hours a day. Local news had to be of 15% of its own broadcasting.