Slovak Television and Radio (STVR)

Slovak Television and Radio (STVR) is Slovakia’s national public broadcasting operator. It was established in July 2024, when the parliament voted to abolish Radio and Television Slovakia (RTVS), which had been created in 2011 through the merger of Slovak Television and Slovak Radio. The restructuring, initiated by the ruling coalition of SMER, Hlas, and SNS, replaced RTVS with a new broadcaster under direct political oversight. STVR operates three television channels, nine radio stations, and three regional radio services, continuing RTVS’s technical and operational structure but under a fundamentally altered governance regime.

Media assets

Television: :1, :2, :Sport, :24

Radio: SRo1: Rádio Slovensko, SRo2: Rádio Regina, SRo3: Rádio Devín, SRo4: Rádio FM, SRo5: Rádio Patria, SRo6: Radio Slovakia International, SRo7: Rádio Pyramida, SRo8: Rádio Litera, SRo9: Rádio Junior

State Media Matrix Typology

State-Controlled (SC)

Ownership and governance

STVR is regulated by the Slovak Television and Radio Act (Law No. 157/2024), which came into effect on 1 July 2024. This act revoked the previous, more autonomous RTVS statute and established a new governance system granting decisive influence to the Ministry of Culture, Ministry of Finance, and Parliament over the appointment of the STVR Board.

The nine-member STVR Board elects both the Director General and the STVR Ethics Committee, concentrating authority in a politically aligned body. The Board composition enables full control by the governing coalition: three members nominated by the Ministry of Culture, one by the Ministry of Financr and five by Parliament.

The appointment procedures fall short of transparency and openness obligations. For the four government-nominated positions, no public call or hearing took place, and the Ministry of Culture merely approved names proposed by an internal commission. Parliamentary appointments are formally debated but effectively limited to coalition-backed candidates, with opposition nominees consistently excluded.

The reform sparked protests among journalists, opposition parties, and civil society groups, with former RTVS director general Ľuboš Machaj calling it a “black day” for Slovak media. Media freedom organizations, including IPI and the European Federation of Journalists, criticized the move as incompatible with the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA).

The current Board is composed entirely of pro-government members. Among them:

• Lukáš Machala, Vice-Chair, serves simultaneously as Chief of Staff at the Ministry of Culture and is a close SNS ally.
• Peter Benčurík, a former spokesperson for oligarchic group Slavia Capital, has ties to SNS-linked networks.
• Jozef Krošlák, ex-spokesperson for authoritarian former PM Vladimír Mečiar.
• David Lindtner, former judge and legal advisor to PM Robert Fico, connected to Defence Minister Robert Kaliňák and representing multiple SMER affiliates in corruption cases.
• Igor Gallo, previously RTVS Board Chair during earlier politicisation, has links to SMER-linked oligarch Jozef Brhel.
• Eva Koprenová, a former SMER government spokesperson.

The remaining members, while not publicly affiliated, were approved through the coalition’s internal coordination process, ensuring full loyalty.

In 2025, the Board appointed Martina Flašíková, daughter of a SMER founder, as Director General. She previously ran a pro-government disinformation website established by her father, where partisan commentary regularly displaced factual reporting. Her election was widely interpreted as an openly political appointment, demonstrating the coalition’s intent to capture the broadcaster.

Earlier, in August 2024, Peter Nittnaus—a former manager under ex-RTVS chief Jaroslav Rezník—was appointed head of STVR’s news channel :24, reviving fears of editorial intimidation. Nittnaus was previously known for enforcing political pressure on journalists under SNS-led governments. These appointments were facilitated by the pro-government composition of the Board, which elected both Nittnaus and Flašíková without meaningful opposition.

Source of funding and budget

Until 2023, RTVS was financed by a mix of licence fees, advertising, and state subsidies. In July 2023, parliament abolished the licence fee, making the broadcaster fully dependent on allocations from the state budget.

For 2024, STVR’s budget was set at 0.12% of GDP, equivalent to about €131 million, down from the previous 0.17% under RTVS, a cut of around €55 million. The reduction caused significant financial strain, forcing discussions about cutting programming and potentially closing one television channel.

While STVR is formally entitled to 0.12% of GDP annually, observers have described this amount as “insufficient” and vulnerable to political manipulation. Additional ad hoc funding from the Ministry of Culture or through so-called “contracts with the state” remains possible, further entrenching dependence on government decisions, according to Media Capture Monitoring Report for Slovakia. Advertising is allowed, and new provisions suggest STVR could expand commercial slots compared to RTVS, although this remains under review.

Editorial independence

RTVS enjoyed a reputation for balanced and independent coverage until recent years, but political influence intensified after 2020, with investigative programming reduced and pressure on journalists mounting.

There were early indications of censorship under the interim leadership already in 2024, when several journalists resigned in protest at editorial interference. The trend intensified following Flašíková’s appointment. Her first decisions included cancelling the discussion programme hosted by respected journalist Michal Havran, an opinion writer for Denník SME, while retaining a parallel show by Jaroslav Daniška, a conservative commentator whose website had previously been labelled disinformational. This asymmetry underscored a deliberate editorial bias.

Flašíková also announced the hiring of a journalist dismissed from a private news channel after airing a pro-Russian interview, known for favourable coverage of coalition politicians, expressed intent to hire another journalist forced to leave an Austrian newspaper for homophobic remarks, and cancelled a fact-checking and disinformation-debunking programme, narrowing editorial diversity further. Collectively, these moves consolidate a right-wing, conservative, and pro-Russian editorial line, reflecting the ideological profile of the ruling parties.

Although Slovak law formally requires public service broadcasting to ensure balance and impartiality, enforcement now lies with the politically appointed STVR Board, which has also established a new Ethical Commission mirroring its own partisan structure. Key members include Eduard Chmelár, former advisor to PM Robert Fico, and Maroš Smolec, nationalist activist and former SMER–SNS candidate in regional elections. These appointments demonstrate the absence of any internal counterbalance to political control.

The European Media Freedom Act (EMFA) implementation act adopted in 2025 formally expands the powers of the Regulatory Authority for Media Services (RpMS) to oversee STVR. However, the RpMS already handled complaints and issued occasional bias rulings under RTVS, making the new powers largely symbolic. Their practical enforcement remains untested.

The transformation of RTVS into STVR has shifted Slovakia’s public broadcaster decisively into the State-Controlled (SC) category of the State Media Matrix. With its governance bodies fully politicized, its finances dependent on annual government allocations, and its newsroom subject to dismissals and censorship, STVR represents the most far-reaching example of political capture of Slovak public broadcasting since the 1990s.

October 2025