A significant number of citizens in Montenegro are informed by media from the region and abroad, creating an ideal ground for the spread of foreign influence. This is what the panel “Elections and lies: who influences the voters?” had to say on the first day of the conference organised by the Centre for Democratic Transition (CDT).
Radomir Kračković, President of the Montenegrin Media Syndicate, points out that the bias of the media in Montenegro is obvious, adding that social networks are the primary source of disinformation.
“Portals from the right spectrum, some of which are not even registered, spread disinformation almost every day. We must not ignore the sources from outside, from the region, especially from Serbia. Disinformation is not easy to counter, as it is more frequent when something big happens, such as elections. We are about to have elections and a more intense political struggle, so it will be interesting to see what happens,” Kračković believes.
In anticipation of the extraordinary parliamentary elections, the CDT proposed the signing of the Code for Fair Elections.
“We want to try to replace the holes we have in the electoral legislation with a declaration of good will, a non-binding rule. So far, the majority has responded well, and it is predicted that 80% of the next Parliament will sign it. We have a section on disinformation and foreign influence to make things at least a little better,” explained CDT Executive Director Dragan Koprivica.
Jasna Jelisic, Head of the Western Balkans Group in the Strategic Communication Sector of the European External Action Service, points out that foreign influence would not be possible without local actors who, among other things, help promote anti-EU narratives.
“The integrity of elections is crucial for the EU, without democratic societies we cannot have the alliance we have. The manipulation of information is affecting the EU integration process of the Western Balkan countries, the media is trying to destroy trust in the EU process. There is a lot to be done, but it can be done”, says Jelisic.
Sunčica Bakić, Director of the Agency for Electronic Media, points to three sources of disinformation:
“First of all, domestic, external and, as the most dangerous group of sources, disinformation mechanisms that use a divided society on various issues such as religion, nation … … and undermine the essence of the democratic capacity of society.”
She explained that a long-term strategy to combat disinformation has four phases – identification, awareness-raising, finding models of struggle and combat.
“We are somewhere between the first two phases,” Bakić said.
The panellists believe that journalists must lead the fight against disinformation, but we also cannot expect anyone other than ourselves to solve the problem of disinformation.
The regional conference “Are there fair elections in a time of disinformation?” is organised by CDT in cooperation with SeeCheck, a regional network of fact-checkers, with the support of the US Embassy in Podgorica and the European Union./Pobjeda/