In Russia, changing the leadership of another independent media

Photo: tvc.ru

The chief editor of the Russian media holding RBC Elizaveta Osetinskaya, the chief editor of the RBC news agency Roman Badanin and the chief editor of the RBC newspaper Maksim Solyus are dismissed from their posts, according to a press release from the holding.

RBC General Director Nikolay Molibog said:

Recently, we talked a lot about how to further develop RBC, and in these conversations we could not reach a consensus on important issues, so we decided to leave. I want to thank Elizabeth, Roman and Maxim for their work and for their contribution to the development of the company.

The last working day of Osetinskaya, Badanin and Solyus at RBC will be May 13. Sources of the Mediazona publication claim that the contracts with Osetinskaya and Badanin were terminated by agreement of the parties, and Solyus was fired against his will. This has not been officially confirmed.

Irina Malkova, who worked as Badanin’s deputy, will fulfill the duties of the head of RBC until 30 June. Malkova wrote on Facebook that tentatively it was until that time that she would work in the holding.

In addition to Malkova, several other employees of the holding reported on the withdrawal.

The head of the Banking and Finance department, Elena Tofanyuk, announced on Facebook that she was resigning “at the request of the company.”

RBC magazine editor Valery Igumenov said that formally he remains the last editor-in-chief at RBC, but “this won’t be for long.”

RBC agency itself on its official Facebook page published a selection of investigative journalism conducted by his staff. It is believed that some of them could be the actual reason for the dismissal of the holding’s management.

"No background"

However, the deputy head of the Ministry of Communications and Mass Media Alexei Volin, commenting on the care of the top managers of the holding, said that he linked the dismissal of RBC executives with politics and considered the reasons for the incident to be purely economic.

There is no need to see a political background in those things where it cannot be found even with a more in-depth digging. To seek politics where pure economics is completely pointless. As there was a hole with debt, it remained. His managers generated losses, not profits.

Shares of the company after the dismissal of management significantly went up on the stock exchange.

Kremlin pressure?

In mid-April, during Vladimir Putin’s “direct line,” the FSB unexpectedly conducted a search in the structures of an investment holding owned by RBC owner Mikhail Prokhorov.

As the security officials later stated, they inspected Prokhorov’s structures for violation of tax legislation and found some evidence of its violation, which they handed over to the tax authorities.

This gave rise to rumors that the holding was under pressure from the Kremlin. Experts linked this to publications about the alleged daughter and son-in-law of Vladimir Putin, as well as about the Panama Archives.

A spokesman for Vladimir Putin, Dmitry Peskov, denies this:

Actually, there is no pressure, and if investigative actions are carried out in respect of some companies, then the question should be addressed specifically to those ministries or investigative bodies that carry out investigative actions.

Previously, a similar story of changing the editor-in-chief occurred with Lenta.ru.

Galina Timchenko has worked at Lenta.ru since its founding in 1999. Since 2004, she has served as editor-in-chief of the publication. In March 2014, the owner of Rambler&Co (which includes Lenta.ru), Alexander Mamut, fired Timchenko without explanation. Following her, almost the entire team left the publication.

They organized the online edition of Meduza in Latvia. According to Meduza itself, the site’s audience in December 2015 reached 3,4 million unique visitors.

Lenta.ru significantly changed its editorial policy, becoming loyal to the authorities.

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