Moscow (AFP)
The shadow of the public oil giant Rosneft, headed by a friend of Vladimir Putin, hangs over several reputed Russian media which had managed to maintain their independence despite the growing influence of the state over the press for 20 years.
Russia's main business daily, Vedomosti, began to shake in March when its owner, Demian Kudriavtsev, announced plans to sell it.
On Friday, the director of an unknown press agency called FederalPress, Ivan Iériomine, became its new owner.
In the aftermath of the March announcement, even before the transaction was completed, a new editor was appointed, Andrei Chmarov.
Since then, journalists have denounced the multiplication of cases of censorship, whether it is a subject on the keeping in power of President Putin, another on the decline in its popularity according to a survey by the Levada center or even articles related to Rosneft.
The editorial staff now believes they know what happened: this oil company is taking control of the newspaper.
In May, an investigation by Vedomosti, Meduza, Forbes Russia and The Bell revealed that Rosneft de facto "controlled" this economic daily and had been able to choose its new bosses because its bank, RRBD, had control of the owner's debt. at the time, Mr. Koudriavtsev.
Allegations denied by the latter and to which Rosneft did not react.
Maxime Troudolioubov, a member of the founding team in 1999 and emeritus editor of the newspaper, is for his part convinced of the veracity of these revelations, affirming that the new editor-in-chief was "chosen to manage the newspaper in the direction of the interests of the new owner "and silence" Vedomosti ".
The powerful boss of Rosneft Igor "Setchine is a kind of hitman. He plays a complicated game of takeovers to build his empire," he continues.
In May, another major economic daily, RBK, found itself in the hot seat after a legal complaint by Rosneft against the newspaper for an article on the Venezuelan assets of the group. Rosneft is claiming no less than 43 billion rubles (550 million euros at the current rate) from RBK.
"Rosneft's complaint is astonishing. We published an article based on public information of which we are not the source. RBK, as an independent economic newspaper, does not serve the interests of anybody, only those of our readers", says AFP's editor-in-chief Peter Kanaev.
But in the event of a legal defeat against the state juggernaut, RBK could be weakened.
- Pitching -
In the 20 years since Vladimir Putin came to power, all national television channels, as well as many radio and newspapers, have passed into the hands of owners close to the Kremlin or have disappeared.
Illustrating this long-standing strategy, the media subsidiary of the state gas giant Gazprom in 2001 became the owner of the television channel NTV, a symbol of freedom of tone in the 1990s.
Co-founded and co-owned by the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Independent Media company of the Dutch entrepreneur Derk Sauer in 1999, at the dawn of the Putin era, Vedomosti accompanied the reign by Vladimir Putin.
The newspaper testified to Russia's full entry into capitalism, with private companies starting to rise from the ashes of the deep economic crisis of 1998.
Vedomosti has since stood out with a little politicized but rigorous coverage of the Russian economy and has changed hands several times, as the possibility for foreigners to own Russian media has been progressively restricted.
If traditional independent media are becoming scarce and can be threatened, the situation is different online.
From the Dojd television channel to the Meduza and The Bell websites, via a multitude of projects on YouTube like the opponent Alexeï Navalny's channel, the media landscape has continued to diversify in recent years and the audience of these web players is on the rise.
"The independent Russian media are still working, they are more successful now than they have been for a long time! New projects are emerging, that is quite promising," said Maxime Troudolioubov.
© 2020 AFP