Says Larysa IVSHYNA, editor in chief, Den/The Day (in an interview with Radio Liberty, Dec. 28. 2011):
“Recent trends in Ukraine’s media point to freedom being aimed against itself. The Ukrainian media were offered a singular opportunity after the 2004 Orange Revolution (popularly referred to as Maidan). However, its aftermath lacked a quality dialog, as well as demands for structural reforms in regard to Ukrainian society and Ukraine’s journalist community.
“Numerous problems have accumulated that must be solved in the first place, problems that result from the 1991 national revolution and the 2004 bourgeois democratic one (if the “bourgeois democratic” qualifier can be applied). The fragile state-like structure is reeling under this weight, with the media adding to the ongoing chaos, considering that the kinds of dialog or agenda they offered were unprofessional. Lots of chances of changes for the better were lost for want of intellectually adequate approach, specifically in the media realm. Ukraine needs a quality alternative. This country is disunited in many respects because its channels fail to produce an adequate picture of the [domestic political] situation despite their vast hi-tech resources. The international media community offers an abstract protesting image as the Man of the Year. I think that in Ukraine this image should resemble someone who can offer a quality alternative.”
