The FINANCIAL — All advertising has been suspended at Imedi TV since the November 7 raid on the News Corporation owned TV station.
“All advertising is suspended as of now since we have no way to run any commercials,” said Lewis Robertson, the head of News Media Caucasus, Imedi’s parent company.
“Imedi TV was used as “a major tool” for organizing the demonstrations, which eventually got out of control, creating “an obvious and real threat of a forceful overthrow of the government,” Tbilisi City Court said in a statement on November 15.
The statement was issued in an attempt to clarify its ruling on the suspension of Imedi TV’s broadcast license and the freezing of its assets.
“Our lawyers are looking into the ruling and will prepare a response as soon as possible. We will obey the law! The ruling against Imedi is totally rubbish. They have to have something to blame the raid on and this is a very convenient response. Proving it in a court of law will be something else for them to have to face though,” declared Robertson.
Meanwhile Imedi TV journalists remain temporarily unemployed.
“All of our employees will be paid full working salaries,” said Robertson.
“We don’t do pre-payment and moreover ProCredit Bank Georgia doesn’t have a direct contract with TV channels. The bank manages these issues through a media agency. The money we invested in advertisements on Imedi TV will be reallocated to other channels. We won’t have any losses and even if we would, they wouldn’t be that much as ProCredit doesn’t spend a lot on advertising. Last month the total TV budget was USD 35 thousand, which is not a big budget anyway,” claimed Philipp Pott, General Manager of ProCredit Bank Georgia.
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