This Thursday, April 4 Cascajosa Conception debuts as interim president of RTVE with a flammable session of the expired and blocked Board of Directors that, after dismissing Elena Sánchez as president and José Pablo López as Content Director, will decide, as we announced days ago, if the public should pay at least 14 million euros to take a niche space that is broadcast on pay television to free-to-air television, The resistance. The premiere previewed exclusively by Informalia on February 28 It has been the spark that has burst the leadership of the Public Corporation but the war between the outgoing president and her number 2 was already evident when we announced, already on January 13, also from this digital, the Elena Sánchez’s veto on the signing of Belén Esteban promoted by their Content Director and the monumental fight between them.
The two cases are not comparable in amount or importance, but they are key to understanding the two irreconcilable positions that confronted the interim president and her own content manager. She maintained that public television should not have the same grid as private television stations such as Telecinco, the model on which it was based. Jose Pablo Lopez to structure La 1, based on gossip programs morning, afternoon and night or realitys full of fourth-class celebrities.
He case of Belén Esteban (as we revealed exclusively, he was going to be a judge in the dance competition presented by Anne Igartiburu), had to do with “the image and prestige of public television,” as he explains to Informalia an RTVE directive. “Collecting in the Corporation the remains of characters that Mediaset expelled to clean up its battered image is not the path of a public television that wants to be able to occupy the quality spaces that private televisions give up,” she argues. The signing of Belén Esteban was vetoed but since they left the Berlusconi network in Spain they have been hired on TVE Terelu Campos, Lydia Lozano, Alba Carrillo o Rocío Carrasco, in different spaces, all of them, of debatable meaning in a public service television, that is capable of satisfying the general interest of society: good values, truthful and independent information, and culture (this includes sport or quality fiction). Public television is not synonymous with boring television.
The cost of signing ‘The People’s Princess’ did not materialize because it was not completed. But this week it became known that Terelu Campos charges 600 euros just for one of the programs of gossip from the public channel in which it intervenes, lasting one hour, and which by the way has disastrous audience ratings, well below the average of the channel (which occupies third place compared to Antena 3 and Telecinco ).
The case of Broncano is different but above all much more expensive. It is, to begin with, a ‘whim’ by Pedro Sánchez himself to deactivate Pablo Motos and El Hormiguero, the scourge of the President of the Government. This is how we advance it before anyone else. The presenter, co-director and co-producer of La Resistencia is guaranteed an ‘armored’ contract by being able to renew for a second season with an audience of just 7.5% share (which is less than 2.5 points of what it has averaged 1 this season).
The negotiation to incorporate the showman uncovered by Informalia has been, as we said, the preamble to a bloody internal war that had notable chapters such as the sit-in of directors promoted by José Pablo López against Elena Sánchez, who took revenge by dismissing him after stopping the signing of Broncano desired by La Moncloa to try to wear down the television scourge of ‘sanchismo’ Pablo Motos.
The dark legacy of José Pablo López
The sympathies of some media for José Pablo López seem to have pushed them to sign hagiographies about the Malaga manager, who say that he has restored competitiveness to La 1 at the cost of distorting a now ‘saved’ public channel, full of realities and fasting from debate spaces, documentaries or successful fiction in prime time.
The star argument of the supporters of the former general director of Telemadrid is the increase in viewership of La 1, which obtained a 8,3% share when López was appointed director of General Content of RTVE, back in April 2022, and this March he closed it with 9.3%. They don’t say that the important thing, if we look at the numbers, is what place it occupies on the podium and how many spectators see it (net).
It should be remembered that the public in the spring of 2022 was at the worst moment in its history in terms of share. But Telecinco did not suffer its worst historical data like now and RTVE did not have the resources that have been burned with a cataract of poorly successful premieres. This past year RTVE has had 1,193.9 million euros, which was 8.4% more than in 2022. The Government has contributed to this increase, which increased its investment in the public sector by 10.5% in the 2023 election by contributing almost half of the budget: 490 million.
The 1 has premiered 14 spaces so far this season and only 2 have reached the house average: the miniseries The law of the sea (broadcast in its entirety on a Sunday, an indefensible cost in the market) and the reality show Bake Off, filled with celebrities and just above the chain’s average. On the other hand, failures have abounded: The Conqueror of the Caribbean disappointed with 8.8% despite having involved a disbursement of 5.6 million euros, dance as you can has sunk to 7.1%, Square was withdrawn after 8 deliveries with 6.7%, DCorazón is failing with 6.6% y The best in history It closed its journey with a very sad 5%.
José Pablo López had already demonstrated his lack of expertise when it came to winning over the audience both at the helm of Trece, which was never able to shake off its eternal 2% share, and on Telemadrid he was unable to improve the competitiveness of the public: he assumed the general management in November 2016 when the house averaged a 4.6% and he was dismissed from the position in July 2021 when the regional level reached 4.7%. Already on Telemadrid he opted for formats with touches of pink and yellow (the weight loss reality show La Báscula; the successor to Here is tomato, The Strawberry Tree; and that of White ants, Elephant footprints).
Defeat of José Pablo against Ayuso in the courts
At TVE we must recognize him for knowing how to program the serial The promise, (very expensive), which was commissioned by the previous team (the one commanded by José Manuel Pérez Tornero) and having rescued The Grand Prix, that triumphed last summer going from more to less. The dismissal of López has finished the horrible March that has suffered due to the drop in La 1’s audience and his defeat in the Superior Court of Justice of the Community of Madrid, which rejected his administrative litigation that he presented in October 2021 on the grounds that his dismissal as general director of Telemadrid had been illegal and unconstitutional.
The plaintiff demanded “the payment of damages based on the remuneration that he would receive, deducting the remuneration of his new job, from his dismissal and until the expiration of his original mandate (01/17/2021) or, subsidiarily, until the appointment of the General Director or the first failure of the appointment procedure”. But the ruling did not consider irregular either the manner of his dismissal or the Royal Decree promoted by the Government of Isabel Díaz Ayuso, which used its absolute majority to appoint as provisional administrator José Antonio Sánchez.
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