LRT council to review alleged director violation behind closed doors

The Lithuanian public broadcaster LRT council will examine behind closed doors whether its director general, Monika Garbačiauskaitė-Budrienė, committed a violation, LRT reported, citing ELTA. The council’s chair, Mindaugas Jurkynas, confirmed the decision.

Jurkynas said an absolute majority of council members supported holding a private meeting because people other than the director general could be discussed. He said the decision was intended to prevent the risk of personal data being disclosed without consent, adding that it was not reached by consensus.

The council is examining whether Garbačiauskaitė-Budrienė committed a violation when data on individual service providers was not disclosed in publicly available reports on programme purchases.

According to ELTA, four council members, Daiva Daugirdienė, Deimantas Jastramskis, Vita Akstinaitė and Dainius Žvirdauskas, supported discussing the issue publicly.

Garbačiauskaitė-Budrienė had previously asked the council to hold a public hearing, saying that the attempt to establish a breach of her duties was unlawful both procedurally and in substance. On Tuesday afternoon, she wrote on Facebook that the council majority had rejected her request.

“I regret that the majority of the LRT council did not agree to examine the issue of the alleged breach of my duties publicly, even though the legal basis for keeping it closed remained unclear. The essence of the issue itself concerns the publication of authors’ surnames,” she wrote.

The General Prosecutor’s Office identified violations in June concerning the failure to disclose data on individual service providers in LRT’s publicly available programme procurement reports. In early July, the LRT council unanimously instructed the administration to correct the violations identified by prosecutors and explain their causes.

In June, Lithuania’s parliament adopted amendments to the LRT law allowing the broadcaster’s director general to be dismissed before the end of their term by a vote of at least two-thirds of all council members if they no longer meet the requirements for impeccable reputation or commit a serious breach of work duties. Most of the amendments will take effect in several years, but the new dismissal procedure for the LRT director general entered into force immediately after the legislation was signed.