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Turkey's radio broadcasters and media buyers now have monthly audience estimates after an absence of a year and a half. The first telephone survey results of the Nielsen/URYAD (National Radio Broadcasters Association) were released in mid-November. The audience estimates are from a sample of persons 12 years and older in the three major urban centres - Istanbul, Ankara and Ismir. In the second half of 2015 electronic measurement will be tested for possible implementation in 2016.
Kral FM ranked 1st in the October audience estimates, November release, with 14.01% listener reach share and jumped to 17.60% in the November survey, December release. TRT FM ranked #2 in both months. Power Türk was 3rd (8.53%) in October but completely disappeared from the top 20 in the next month. That allowed Super FM to move into 3rd place (6.13%), followed by Metro FM (5.57%).
Show Radyo placed 5th in the November audience estimates (5.49%), up from 9th place the previous month. Traditional Turkish music channel Radio Seymen ranked 6th in both months, followed by Best FM, Slowtürk and Joy Turk. International pop music station Number1 appeared as tenth in the November audience estimates, not appearing in the previous months survey. (See Turkey - Major Media - Radio Broadcasting in Resources here)
A profile of radio listeners in Turkey shows the mediums popularity among younger, urban populations. Media regulator RTüK released results of the national 2014 Radio Listening Trends Survey in late December. Persons over 15 years are listening to radio are spending 3 hours and 23 minutes each weekday though total reach is just 43% of the population.
Young people spend more time with radio than older folk. As educational and income levels rise, so does radio listening. People living in the Anatolian Plateau - Central Turkey - are most attached to radio listening, those in the Mediterranean region least. Two out of five (40%) hear their favorite channels on the traditional stationary receiver, 33% on a car radio, 28% on a mobile phone and 12% via the internet.
Just under two-thirds of those surveyed prefer national radio channels, the rest local and regional stations. "We rank third in Europe in terms of currently weekly radio listening time," said Deputy Prime Minister Yalcin Akdogan, who headlined the data release press conference, quoted by haber7.com (December 25). "Unfortunately, we don't rely on radio in the same terms... but we understand the importance of radio, especially in time of crisis. I remember very well the 1999 earthquakes when everyone was thrown into the streets with telephones service out and everybody finding information on the radio."
A team of Azeri State prosecutors supported by armed security officers raided the Baku office of Radio Azadliq, affiliate of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), investigating "a grave crime" involving foreign funding of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), said the Prosecutor General's office in a statement to AP (December 26) without elaboration. Documents and broadcast equipment were seized as the security officers held staff members in single room for several hours before the office was sealed. Prosecutors have ordered several staff members to appear for questioning.
Radio Azadliq (Azadliq Radiosu) has broadcast in Azerbaijan since 1953, relegated in 2009 to satellite and internet distribution when the government of President Ilkham Aliev curtailed terrestrial broadcast distribution of international broadcasters including the BBC. Several well-known international NGOs including Oxfam and IREX have closed Azeri operations in recent months after government raids and bank account seizures. In October President Aliev signed legislative amendments requiring government approval for all grants-in-aid from foreign sources and restrictions on foreign funding of NGOs. RFE/RL offices and affiliates are principally funded by the United States government. (See more about international broadcasting here) (See more sbout press/media freedom here)
The raid comes three weeks free-lance reporter and Radio Azadliq contributor Khadija Ismayilova was arrested and jailed. Ms Ismayilova has reported long and often on President Aliev's family ties to corruption. Transparency International ranked Azerbaijan 126th in its 2014 Corruption Perceptions Index, tied with Pakistan, slightly better than the Russian Federation (136th). The day before her arrest Ramiz Mehdiyev, head of presidential administration, referred to Ms Ismayilova as "a journalist working against the government" and the Radio Azadliq staff as "foreign spies.
"The order (for the raid) comes from the top as retaliation for our reporting and as a thuggish effort to silence RFE/RL," said chief editor and co-CEO Nenad Pejic, in a statement. (See RFE/RL presser here) Azerbaijan has no functioning local media outside direct government control.
"Words fail for describing the scale of the crackdown under way," said Reporters sans Frontiers (RSF) Eastern Europe and Central Asia director Johann Bihr in a statement (December 26). RSF's 2014 World Press Freedom Index ranked Azerbaijan 160th, slightly worse than Belarus (157th) and nearly tied with Kazakhstan (161st).
Media control - internal and external - is important to dictators who need that heroic image constantly burnished. Sacha Baron Cohen's comedy film The Dictator, loosely some say based on President Aliev and his family's lifestyle, was banned in Baku in 2012. There was, then, no organised retaliation against the producer.
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