RCS&RDS and Antena Group accuse each other of illegal practices

In an official press release, RCS&RDS confirmed that one of the managers of RCS&RDS submitted a complaint about being blackmailed by Antena TV Group via its general manager Sorin Alexandrescu.

“The aim of the blackmail was to push for the signing of a contract which referred to the satellite broadcasting of channels in the Antena TV Group, in the conditions imposed by them, for a sum higher than EUR 30 million,” said the press release.

The company also said that “this blackmail is a continuation of a negative media campaign by Antena TV Group against our company over the past years, in the attempt to force us to pay exorbitant sums for broadcasting its channels.”

On the other hand, Antena 3 also stated last week that “RCS&RDS has started two years ago an open war against Intact media group, eliminating abusively all the channels of the media group from the distribution program. During the mandate of the Boc government, RCS-RDS was accused by other market operators that it received political favors in exchange for services it did for the Democrat-Liberal Party,” according to Antena 3.

Last week, Sorin Alexandrescu (in picture), general manager of the Antena 1 channel, was detained by the National Anti-corruption Department (DNA), being accused of blackmailing the manager of a company.

Alexandrescu is being investigated for allegedly blackmailing the administrator of telecom operator RCS&RDS to sign a contract under his own terms.

On April 20, 2012, RCS&RDS announced that it would no longer broadcast Antena 1, Antena 3 and Euforia TV on its Digi satellite TV platform since it is not willing to pay EUR 7 million per year, which was charged by the Antena Group for broadcasting these channels via satellite.

Intact Media Group accused RCS & RDS of “un-commercial practices” claiming the company decided “without informing its partners or subscribers beforehand, to take out from the satellite platform the Antena 1 and Antena 3 TV channels, starting at midnight, on April 20.”

Prosecutors suspect that Alexandrescu tried to make sure that the Antena1 and Antena3 channels are broadcast via the Digi satellite platform using illegal practices.