Media Trade Union begins campaign against corruption

At a press conference on 8 November Ukraine’s Independent Trade Union together with the organization “Hidna [Worthy] Ukraine presented a project for anti-corruption journalist investigations “Worthy democracy: the media against corruption.

The press conference was addressed by the head of the project, Ihor Chaika, the Head of the Union Serhiy Huz and Johanna Grossman. Director of “Hidna Ukraina”,

Ihor Chaika who has been involved in issues related to fighting corruption in the media for many years, explained that the project had in fact been running for a while, but they had waited before announcing it in order to have some initial results.

The project includes for example the creation of a website “Worthy democracy” which will contain journalists’ anti-corruption investigations, interviews with experts, information about actions aimed at combating corruption in Ukrainian society, and so forth.

Ihor Chaika added that on the basis of information gathered on the website, a bulletin in electronic form would be prepared on a monthly basis and sent to media outlets, civic organizations and media experts. The project will result in a printed bulletin “The Media against corruption” with the most interesting journalist investigations from the site being published. The publication will contain information on issues of corruption in Ukraine, overviews and analytical articles.

The project will also include a half-hour film on journalist investigations in Lviv, Kharkiv and the Crimea. The filming for this has already begun.

It will include interviews with Lviv journalists who almost paid with their lives for their investigations. Apparently the interview was taken in a hospital ward.  The premiere viewing is planned for the end of January 2008. It will be available to all those interested, and can be shown on nationwide television as long as the TV channels will show it free of charge.

The project team hope also to  be able to provide real help to journalists who are carrying out journalist investigations, carrying out training seminars and giving legal consultations. Where necessary they will also defend journalists as the media union regularly does.

The project which is supported by the programme “Promoting active public participation in countering corruption in Ukraine Hidna Ukraina” is initially designed to last half a year, however Ihor Chaika hopes that they will manage to find funding in order to continue it after this, since after all journalists will not stop needing their assistance in 6 months.