Recent Developments Surrounding the Resignation of Eduard Sagalayev
Eduard Sagalayev, who resigned as head of All-Russian
State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company on 10th February, has said
that he resigned in order to protect the reputation of the company after
allegations of financial impropriety. He said that the accusations
against him were false and he would be suing those responsible in the courts.
Sagalayev also said that the allegations came after he had repeatedly refused
to alter editorial policy under pressure from government officials.
The following are excerpts from an interview with Sagalayev, broadcast
by NTV:
[Presenter] Here is another edition of the
“Hero of the Day” programme. Yevgeniy Kiselev in the studio.
The main event of the day is the resignation of the head of Russian TV,
Eduard Sagalayev. Eduard Sagalayev, chairman of the VGTRK [All-Russian
State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company] tendered his resignation
to the president today [10th February], and the president accepted it.
Eduard Sagalayev is our guest live in our studio today. . .
.
Tell me please, what made you write your statement,
what made you tender your resignation to the president?
[Sagalayev] If you do not mind, I would like
to read out my statement, because I think it would be of interest to those
who are concerned with this situation, so I can read the text verbatim—I
have simply made a photocopy of the statement I wrote to the president.
. . .
Esteemed Boris Nikolayevich, for one year I have
been chairman of the All-Russian State Television and Radio Broadcasting
Company. I have worked honestly, giving my all. It is up to
the viewers and the listeners to judge where I have succeeded and where
I have failed. Unfortunately, a number of present and former members
of the VGTRK staff were incited to produce a dirty publication, following
which a row has erupted surrounding the company. I have approached
the judiciary and I shall welcome any audits. Neither I nor my comrades
are involved in any improper activities, and this will be proved.
The row that has been started, however, hinders
the normal work and life of the staff, provokes unnecessary passions and
is threatening to split the company. I have never clung to managerial
posts, I have never cared about anything but the cause, about the television
station I love. In this situation, I believe that the most dignified
step is for me to tender my resignation. I am leaving this post,
but retaining my good name and my belief in the future of the Russian state
TV and radio. [Signed] Eduard Sagalayev, 10th February. .
. .
[Q] In your statement, you give the main reason
why you decided to tender your resignation. It was the rather notorious
and controversial publication in ‘Novaya Gazeta’[newspaper] a week ago,
last Monday [3rd February], when it published a letter signed by many former
members of staff. . . . I would not like to relate
it now, but since not everyone probably reads this newspaper and therefore
have to rely on rumours, I would just say briefly that it accused you of
major financial and other irregularities.
[A] Yes, for example it says that for each
edition of the “Open News” programme, which I present together with Svetlana
Sorokina and, I hope, we shall continue to present, it says that for each
edition I received a fee of 25,000 dollars.
[Q] Twenty-five thousand dollars?
[A] Yes, for each edition. Can you imagine.
You work in TV yourself, presenting a very difficult programme—you know
the rates.
[Q] There simply aren’t any rates on this scale.
[A] Quite right, there aren’t, but even this
is not the point. You see, when I started to present my very first
TV programme, “The 12th Floor” made by the youth department of [Soviet]
central television, I was already the head of that department at the time,
and I decided that I could not receive even one kopeck in fees from the
TV company of which I am the head. The same thing happened later
with the “Seven Days” programme, where you and I once worked together,
and with the programme “In the World of People” on Channel Six, and again
with the programme “Open News.” I did not receive any fee at all because
I regard it is improper for myself.
[Q] Yes, I see. Here at NTV our practice
is that no-one receives any fees, and it may well be a sensible solution
to this problem. People should work for their salaries, although,
as far as I know, VGTRK salaries are very low.
[A] Yes, this is, unfortunately, one of the
defects of state television. People have tiny salaries, so in order
to keep them, one has to pay some kind of bonuses, look for various ways
of providing them with social welfare, so we give them lunch money, travel
expenses, etc. Moreover, we still have rates established some 30
years ago, which determine the salaries we have to pay out. And when
I approached the government—[changes tack] This letter appeared literally
a few days before the date on which —
[Q, interrupting] So you are saying the appearance
of the letter was no coincidence.
[A] No coincidence at all.
[Q] It was a few days before the date on which
they had to discuss —
[A, interrupting] No coincidence at all! The
government was due to discuss further development measures for VGTRK.[Q]
So the time was chosen quite deliberately?
[A] No doubt. That is why I wrote in
my statement that the letter had been incited.
[Q] Sorry, but by whom was it incited?
[A] Well, first of all, I would like to say
that those people—those three people currently working with the company,
I am not talking about those who left, or rather were forced to leave under
pressure from me—but those who still work with the company had the opportunity
to make any complaints to me personally at a board meeting, at any of the
public meetings that take place at state TV. . . .
Well, you know, I am not one to talk about a secret
plot against Eduard Sagalayev. The fact is that, in that year when
I was the head of the company, there were at least 15 attempts to dismiss
me. There were various pretexts. At one point, an attempt was
made to link me to [Yeltsin’s former chief bodyguard Aleksandr] Korzhakov
and [former First Deputy Prime Minister Oleg] Soskovets, who —
[Q, interrupting] Yes, I have actually specially
prepared myself – please forgive me—I found this article in ‘Izvestiya,’
in which you spoke about it in detail. That was back in July [1996],
before the government was formed, immediately after the [presidential]
election.
[A] Yes, it was then that the attempt was made
to link me to this group.
[Q] But, after all, Soskovets did play a part
on your appointment.
[A] He did indeed and I have never tried to
hide this. It was none other than Soskovets, and later Soskovets
and Korzhakov, who invited me and said Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin was asking
me to become chairman of the VGTRK. First I declined, and then said
I could only make a decision in a personal discussion with Boris Nikolayevich
Yeltsin. Then I was invited to go to Yekaterinburg. It was
Yeltsin’s first campaign trip, during which he announced he would be standing
for president. And it was there that he made that offer to me, asked
me to —
[Q, interrupting] And you accepted.
[Sagalayev] Yes, I accepted. So Soskovets
and Korzhakov were the mediators, the people who had, as I thought, been
asked by the president to make this offer to me, to sound me out, as it
were—nothing more than that. And nothing less either.
[Q] But then it transpired that neither [Prime
Minister Viktor] Chernomyrdin nor [Chairman of the Russian Federal Service
for Television and Radio Broadcasting Valentin] Lazutkin, neither [Viktor]
Ilyushin [at the time—principal aide to the president] nor any other person
in charge of the mass media knew anything about it.
[A] Yes, it came as a shock to me, and that
was what I said in that interview [in ‘Izvestiya’]. So that was just
one incident in which an attempt was made to wash me ashore, as it were.[Q]
Did you not feel in the months that followed that you were being subjected
to a kind of ostracism by those who take decisions concerning the mass
media, the future of the state mass media, and who persistently regarded
you as a man from another team?
[A] I find it difficult to answer this question,
because I myself never tried to establish very close contacts with those
in charge of the mass media. . . . I never tried
to get instructions from the top; this kind of thing always pained me.
Generally speaking, if one compares the life of someone who works for independent
TV with that of someone working for state TV—and you know that for six
years I was involved in setting up TV-6—I can say that nearly every day
I spent in this post I earned myself at least one enemy, because every
day I received recommendations and guidelines to which I had to answer
no—because either they were downright stupid, or they were attempts to
distort the objective view of what was going on in the country. .
. .
[Q] Eduard Mikhaylovich, in your interview
in ‘Izvestiya’ in July, you spoke of a very interesting, even striking,
incident. During the election campaign, someone from one of the ministries
that have their own forces [Russian: silovyye struktury] came to you and
said, you know, don’t let’s cover Chechnya. Visits of this kind were
probably made to everyone, people did come to us too, saying, you know,
lads, don’t let’s cover Chechnya. And when you, as you write here,
told him to go to hell, he told you, you know, incidentally, we can easily
send you to prison—a couple of days ago I actually saved you from prison,
when they wanted to set you up with a bribe of several thousand dollars.
[A] Yes, this incident did take place.
. . .
[Q] Do you not think it was a selfish decision.
If every one of us, the people convinced that they are right, convinced
that they are doing what they have to do, if we all start slamming the
door and resigning after being slandered, then we shall soon have only
scum in all the posts.
[A] My feeling is that many people accused
rightly are clinging to their posts and not resigning. In this case
there were of course some people who advised me to carry on fighting, and
there were people who publicly backed me—for example [Moscow Mayor] Yuriy
Mikhaylovich Luzhkov, who published a letter in ‘Rossiyskaya Gazeta’[newspaper],
in which he said, leave Sagalayev alone and let him work—that was the purport
of his letter. I received a huge number of calls and letters following
the publication, both from well-known people and from less well-known ones
in Russia, who said I should not fret and become upset, I should fight
and banish those people from the company, because their action was mean
and cowardly. . . .
[Q] But who did they pushing, who ordered it
all?
[A] Those who did not like to see me in this
post, those who cannot bear my unbiased position, my unwillingness to play
their games, in which they regularly —
[Q, interrupting] Political or financial games?
[A] Both political and financial. For
example, there was a situation when it was believed necessary to bring
down a certain bank. I was advised to participate in the process.
Instead, I gave the head of the bank the opportunity to speak. .
. .
NTV, Moscow, February 10, 1997
II. New Chief Takes over at Troubled State TV.
By Andrei Zolotov Jr.
Popular TV commentator Nikolai Svandze was named
chairman of RTR, the Russian state television and radio company, Monday
following the resignation of Eduart Sagalayev amid accusations of corruption.
Appointed to the influential position by President
Boris Yeltsin, Svanidze, 41, is a veteran journalist best known as the
anchor of “Zerkalo,” a program on current events with liberal commentary.
Since last August, Svanidze has been deputy chairman of information and
political programming at the state-owned RTR, which is Russia’s second-largest
national television channel.
The new chairman’s bearded face, calm manner and
pro-democratic views first became known to Russians in 1991, when he began
to appear on the “Vesti” evening news program. He and well-known
anchor Svetlana Sorokina were on the air the night of October 3, 1993,
when the Ostankino television center was under siege by anti-Yeltsin forces
and RTR was the only functioning television channel.
Sagalayev, who had led the company since February
1996, resigned Monday after current and former company officials accused
him of corruption, a dictatorial style of management and “using budge funds
for personal enrichment and for the enrichment of a group of businessmen
invited by him to leading posts.”
The allegations were made in a letter published
in the weekly Novaya Gazeta. Sagalayev denied the accusations and
said he would sue the authors.
Sagalayev did not specify why he resigned, but he
told ITAR-TASS on Monday he had decided to leave “to preserve the unity
of the collective and the stability of Russian state television.”
He said he departs “with a clear conscience and head held high.”
Sagalayev said the attacks against him were linked
to a crucial government meeting on the future of RTR that he said was to
have taken place last week.
Sagalayev gave no indication of the agenda for the
meeting but said he advocated continuing state control of RTR and opposed
moves to “privatize” the company.
Rumors about Sagalayev’s possible resignation began
circulating last summer when Deputy Prime Minister Oleg Soskovets and chief
presidential bodyguard Alexander Korzhakov were fired as a result of infighting
among Yeltsin’s staff. At the time, Sagalayev acknowledged that Soskovets
and Korzhakov had been responsible for his appointment to the powerful
position at Channel 2.
But the fact that he remained for another six months
as the head of the country’s fully government-owned television company
indicates that his resignation is not directly related to his political
affiliations.
According to Natalia Osipova, a spokesperson for
VGTRK, which operates RTR, both Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin and
presidential Chief of Staff Anatoly Chubais urged Sagalayev to stay in
office during a meeting Monday, but he was adamant in his decision to go.
According to Osipova, Sagalyev was the victim of
mid-level employees who resented his leadership from the very beginning.
Now, when “the situation has gone beyond the framework of professional
arguments” and into “the sphere of dirty laundry,” she said, Sagalayev
decided to resign.
Unlike Sagalayev, who came to RTR from the position
of president of the private TV-6 channel, the incoming chairman is an insider,
which raises hopes that he will be supported by the channel’s employees.
Svanidze told ITAR-TASS yesterday that he thinks he was chosen because
he had worked at the company “from the first brick.”
“Sagalayev was a wonderful leader, and Svanidze
was a brilliant commentator. It seems to me that we will lose them
both,” said Professor Yassen Zassoursky, dean of the Journalism Department
of Moscow State University.
The Moscow Times, February 11, 1997
III. New head of state broadcasting company takes over.
ITAR-TASS correspondent Tamara Ivanova: The new chairman
of the All-Russian State TV and Radio Broadcasting Company, VGTRK, Nikolay
Svanidze, was today presented to the company’ s workforce by Russian Deputy
Prime Minister Vitaliy Ignatenko.
At a ceremony held in the room from which the “Vesti”
news programme is broadcast, Vitaliy Ignatenko spoke of Nikolay Svanidze
as “a man who can do a lot of good for Russian TV.” He added that Russian
President Boris Yeltsin, when signing the decree on the appointment of
the new chairman of the VGTRK on [10th February], had spoken of Nikolay
Svanidze’s great professionalism as a journalist.
Vitaliy Ignatenko stressed that it is very difficult
for journalists today “not to go along with the situation or to act as
an instrument of current politics, but to help the authorities to see the
fruits of the ongoing reforms and society to see the work done by the authorities.”
According to the deputy prime minister, politicians will have to “get used
to the Svanidze style, to the style of Russian TV.”
After reading out the president’s decree releasing
the [former] chairman of the VGTRK, Eduard Sagalayev, from his duties at
his own request, Vitaliy Ignatenko reported that Boris Yeltsin considers
the former company chairman to be “a major figure in the Russian television
world” and hopes that Sagalayev will continue working in television.
On behalf of the president’s administration, Maksim
Boyko confirmed that Boris Yeltsin did not need to be told who Nikolay
Svanidze was or to have it proved to him that he is the best candidate
for the post of chairman of the VGTRK.
Eduard Sagalayev thanked the staff of the VGTRK,
stating that in “Vesti,” he had for the first time in his life encountered
such incredible devotion to the job, and he wished his colleagues success.
Nikolay Svanidze said that it was a great honour
for him to become the chairman of the VGTRK as the “third in the remarkable
company of Oleg Poptsov [Sagalayev’s predecessor] and Eduard Sagalayev.”
He said that the main thing for him would be not to lose sight of himself
as a journalist and to maintain the identity of the “Vesti” programme and
the whole of Russian TV.
ITAR-TASS news agency (World Service), Moscow, February 11, 1997
IV. Former head of Russia TV opposed to its flotation.
The Russian Federation government’s department of
Culture and Information today gave ITAR-TASS a report which says: A letter
has arrived, addressed to Viktor Chernomyrdin, Russian prime minister,
from Eduard Sagalayev, chairman of the All-Russia State TV and Radio Broadcasting
Company, VGTRK, officially setting out his views concerning alleged flotation
plans for the VGTRK.
“My position has been and remains invariable: Russia
needs state TV and radio channels. This position does not depend
on what happens to be expedient at a given moment in time or on the posts
I occupy or will occupy in future,” Eduard Sagalayev emphasized.
The company’s collegium, which met recently, also
confirmed the view that the channel should retain its state-owned status.
The VGTRK chairman thinks that restructuring, the Russia TV channel’s
drive to set up a “people’s television,” and changes affecting departments
and personnel policy are issues which should be discussed, above all, within
the company itself, instead of spilling over into public activities which
do not have all that much to do with common decency.
As for accusations of financial abuse, Eduard Sagalayev
has already started appropriate legal proceedings and hopes that the court
will be able to dot all the i’s regarding this question.
In his letter to the prime minister, the VGTRK chairman
confirmed again that he is responsible for his channel’s work and is “ready
to answer for any infringements in the company’s work.”
ITAR-TASS news agency (World Service), Moscow, February 8, 1997
V. VGTRK chairman to sue for libel over allegations in letter.
Chairman of the All-Russia State TV and Radio
Broadcasting Company [VGTRK] Eduard Sagalayev announced today that he would
take to court the authors of a letter published yesterday [3rd February]
in ‘Novaya Gazeta.’ Several other events occurred today in connection with
that situation. Here is a report by Vladimir Lenskiy:
[Correspondent] The Russian government does
not deem it expedient to auction the State TV and Radio Company.
Igor Shabdurasulov, the head of the Department of Culture and Information,
said this today. At the same time, the government is now examining
documents on financial violations alleged to have been committed by Eduard
Sagalayev, the present chairman of VGTRK.
[Igor Shabdurasulov, head of the Department of Culture and Information
of the Russian Federation government] That material
will be examined and conclusions as to how far what was published in ‘
Novaya Gazeta’ corresponds to reality may be drawn only after the material
has been examined. And probably after that we will discuss the possibility,
the advisability, the need, let’s say, to replace the leadership of the
VGTRK company.
Letter’s authors criticize Sagalayev
[Correspondent] On Monday, ‘Novaya Gazeta’
published an open letter by high-ranking VGTRK officials who still work
there or who have been dismissed.
[Aleksandr Nekhoroshev, former editor in chief of “Vesti,” at a news
conference] The first anniversary of the appointment
of Eduard Mikhaylovich to the post of chairman of VGTRK will be marked
soon. We are marking that year as a year of the degradation of state
television. The situation is such that state television is in fact
standing on the verge of destruction.
[Correspondent] The officials who signed the
letter say that 52 per cent of programmes shown on the second channel now
have been bought in and that the channel’s own production capacity is standing
idle. The authors of the letter claim that many programmes on Russian
Television are being bought at clearly higher prices from the business
partners of a deputy chairman of VGTRK and that Sagalayev himself receives
fabulous fees for his appearances on air. The authors of the letter
in ‘Novaya Gazeta’ are prepared to go to court to prove they are right.[Yelena
Dmitriyeva, director of VGTRK legal directorate, at a news conference]
If we ever meet in court, there is no doubt that we will maintain the contentious
nature of the case. If Eduard Mikhaylovich has decided to resolve
relations with us by this means, we are ready to resolve them by such means,
too.
Sagalayev plans legal action
[Correspondent] Eduard Sagalayev is also preparing
to go to court. Lawyer Genrikh Padva on his behalf has already written
a statement of claim. The chairman of the VGTRK has already obtained
documents refuting any talk about his high fees.
[Sagalayev] I regard that as libel, as information
which has nothing in common with reality, with real facts.
[Correspondent] Eduard Sagalayev says that
the appearance of the letter in ‘Novaya Gazeta’ is an act of revenge by
company officials whom he proposed should leave their posts after an audit
by the Ministry of Finance. The audit was carried out at the initiative
of Sagalayev immediately after this appointment.
[Sagalayev] Quite honestly, I sighed when the
commission had finished its work and I read its results. I have to
say that a large group of those who held the news conference today are
people whom I suggested should leave the company in connection with the
fact that they had inflicted substantial financial, moral or other damage.
[Correspondent] In the history of Russian television,
the case of Sagalayev versus highest-ranking VGTRK officials may become
the first of its kind. No matter what both sides might say in court,
that spectacle will hardly be of interest to television viewers.
Vladimir Lenskiy, Vladimir Molchanov, NTV
[Presenter] ITAR-TASS has reported in the last
half hour that Eduard Sagalayev has already sent to the government of Russia
documents refuting the accusations levelled against him in the press.
Igor Shabdurasulov, the head of the Department of
Culture and Information of the government of Russia, stated that the question
of the further development of VGTRK won’t be examined at the sitting of
the government on 13th February, as Sagalayev said. In the opinion
of Shabdurasulov, that question won’t be raised before March.
NTV, Moscow, February 4, 1997
VI. VGTRK chairman Sagalayev criticized in letter by officials.
A letter from nine former and current officials
of the All-Russia State TV and Radio Company (VGTRK), which criticized
the organization’ s chairman, Eduard Sagalayev, was published by the Moscow
newspaper ‘ Novaya Gazeta’ on 3rd February. The authors said that
under Sagalayev’ s chairmanship, VGTRK had become completely commercialized.
The idea of state-run television had been destroyed, and instead it had
become a sector in which various financial and political groups were furthering
their own interests. The officials also criticized VGTRK’s programming
policy, which they said had made the station’s ratings slump. Following
is the text of the letter, as published by ‘Novaya Gazeta’ on 3rd February;
first paragraph is introduction; subheadings as published:
In the era of the redistribution of property, television
has become a sphere of interests of various financial and political groups.
The person who owns the button owns not only the “brainwashing” [facilities],
but also the brains themselves. Moreover, this is a profitable business.
There they are, the second channel—the All-Russia State Television and
Radio Company [VGTRK], its boss Eduard Sagalayev, his present and former
deputies. It is the latter who brought these materials [the letter]
to our office.
It will be one year in February since E.M.
Sagalayev began work in the capacity of VGTRK chairman.
Today we (the authors of the letter) have an opportunity
to assess this period as the destruction of the idea of state-run television,
its complete commercialization, and its financial, creative and personnel
degradation—despite E.M. Sagalayev’s initial statements at the time
he took office.
Sagalayev has carried into effect the “dream of
all new Russians”—to use [state] budget appropriations for his own enrichment
and the enrichment of a group of businessmen he invited to take leading
positions.
Among the signatures added to this appeal one will
not find the names of the previous VGTRK chairman, O.M. Poptsov, and the
former general director, A.G. Lysenko. But we, reading and hearing
interviews with them, do not doubt that they fully share the point of view
presented here.
Former workers and members of the VGTRK collegium:
‘Novaya Gazeta,’ Moscow, February 3, 1997
VII. Head of broadcasting company says he won’t “organize repressions.”
“I have no intention of organizing any repressions,”
Eduard Sagalayev, the chairman of the All-Russian State Television and
Radio Broadcasting Company [ASTRBC], has said in an interview for the Ekho
Moskvy radio station, commenting on a letter by former employees and members
of the collegium of the ASTRBC, published in ‘Novaya Gazeta,’ in which
they accuse the chairman of the company, Eduard Sagalayev, of “destroying
the ideas of state television and permitting its complete commercialization
and financial and creative degradation, and running down its manpower.”
According to Sagalayev, he does not intend to sack
one of the authors of the letter, the head of the board of directors of
the ASTRBC’s news programmes, Aleksandr Nekhoroshev. “But in his
position, I would consider it beneath my dignity to work under someone
about whom one had written such filthy things in the paper,” the ASTRBC
chairman stressed. “And I can’t describe it as anything other than
filth. If he has any self-respect, he must go. There are certain
accepted forms of gentlemanly behaviour. I can’t pass the time of
day with him or shake him by the hand after he has written such blatant
lies about me.”
“I see all this as the convulsions of an old team
on its way out,” Sagalayev said.
“It seems to me that in this instance, it is on
the one hand just a petty squabble, but on the other hand some people have
felt that now is the right time to launch themselves on Sagalayev.
In the run-up to the Russian government’s session on questions of the future
development of the ASTRBC, and in a general atmosphere where there is an
active shift in the sphere of the media, and where I am like a bone in
the throat of those people who want to stop the monopoly in this important
political and financial market, because I’m my own man [sentence as received].”
[Sagalayev has been invited to attend the Russian
Duma session on 21st February “to give explanations” about the “row” at
the television company, according to Ostankino Radio Mayak, Moscow, in
Russian 0900 gmt 5 Feb 97.]
Ekho Moskvy news agency, Moscow, February 4, 1997