ERR chief Roose: Public broadcaster leadership must not become election campaign tool

ERR board chairman Erik Roose has warned that changing the public broadcaster's governance model just before elections looks bad and threatens editorial independence. He argues the planned changes would allow each new coalition to replace the ERR supervisory board with a more favourable one, undermining the broadcaster's autonomy.

Erik Roose, chairman of the board of Estonia's public broadcaster ERR (Eesti Rahvusringhääling), has raised the alarm over plans to reform the broadcaster's governance structure immediately ahead of elections, calling the timing highly questionable and potentially damaging to public trust.

Roose warned that the proposed governance changes would create a mechanism by which any incoming coalition government could replace the ERR supervisory board with members more aligned to its political preferences. In his view, this would directly erode ERR's editorial independence — a cornerstone of credible public broadcasting.

Independence under threat

The ERR chief stressed that public broadcasters must be shielded from political interference, particularly during election periods when media coverage has an outsized influence on voter opinion. Making structural governance changes at such a sensitive moment, Roose argued, sends entirely the wrong signal about political intentions toward the media.

Roose's comments come amid a broader debate in Estonia about the relationship between political institutions and publicly funded media. Critics of the proposed changes have echoed his concerns, noting that international standards for public broadcasting explicitly call for governance models that insulate editorial decisions from political cycles.

Calls for caution

The ERR board chairman has called on policymakers to reconsider the timing of any reforms, suggesting that changes of such magnitude should be debated transparently and implemented well outside of election season. He underlined that ERR's credibility — and its value to Estonian democracy — rests on the public's confidence that its journalism is free from political pressure.