Language ombudsman: Songs in Russian have completely disappeared from Ukrainian radio stations
Songs in Russian are no longer heard on the airwaves of national radio stations. There are, however, frequent instances of the non-state language being used in radio broadcasts.
The Office of the Commissioner for Protection of the State Language has reported that the secretariat analysed the daily broadcasts of 14 national radio stations on 2 and 7 December 2023.
The experts did not find a single case of a Russian-language song being broadcast. Of the 8,334 songs that were broadcast over the two days, 5,599 were in Ukrainian (67.3%), 2,732 were in official EU languages (32.7%), and 3 were in Georgian.
In addition, five broadcasters played songs exclusively in Ukrainian, five more broadcasters had over 50% of their songs in Ukrainian, and four others played more music in EU languages.
"For the second year in a row, we have recorded that in response to Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, not only songs by Russian artists but also songs in Russian have disappeared from the airwaves of Ukrainian radio stations," said Taras Kremin, the language ombudsman.
"Last year, out of almost 4,000 songs analysed, only one was in Russian, and this year, out of more than 8,000, not a single one was in Russian."
At the same time, there were cases of the non-state language being used by presenters and guests on news and entertainment programmes on Ukrainske Radio, Radio NV, Hit FM, Melodia FM and Perets FM.
"Unfortunately, the practice of Ukrainian-Russian bilingualism occurs not only on TV channels, but also on radio stations. It’s true that this is not breaking the law – Ukraine’s current legislation allows for modest use of the non-state language on Ukrainian-language programmes. However, given that Russia's war against Ukraine has been going on for decades, it’s time for Ukrainian to be used exclusively on air without waiting for laws [to be passed]," Kremin said.
For reference:
Starting from 1 January, at least 90% of TV and radio content must be in Ukrainian.
Support UP or become our patron!
