‘We have gathered our will in a fist and do not allow ourselves to relax,’ the editor of the Nikopol-based Pivdenna Zoria newspaper

For people, the publication of a newspaper is a sign of stability, just like the availability of electricity, gas, and heating. This is the belief of Inna Shvydka, editor-in-chief of Pivdenna Zoria, a newspaper that continues to publish despite the shelling of the building where the editorial office is located. “Nikopol is being shelled incessantly from the opposite side of the Dnipro,” Inna Mykhailivna told the NUJU, “They shell several times a day, mostly at night. We’ve gotten used to it a bit, although you can’t get used to it completely: it’s too loud and scary. There is destruction all over Nikopol district and in the city center. If it’s a working day, we hide in the basement of the building where the editorial office is located. This is the center of the city. On the night of September 18, 2022, we were hit… Thank God, no one was injured.” Because of the shelling, a window in the room where the editorial office is located was smashed. “It’s good that we have only one window,” the editor adds. According to her, there are so many broken windows in Nikopol that glass cannot be found. Moreover, there is little point in glazing windows that will be blown out again in the coming days. Therefore, the townspeople found a way out: they covered the window openings with OSB (Particle)-board and sealed them with several layers of polyethylene. The editorial office of the Pivdenna Zoria newspaper did the same. “Our accountant’s husband has golden hands. He covered it so well that in winter it was warmer than in previous years,” Inna Shvydka says with some pride. “It’s dark… What else can we do?” The newspaper is 92 years old. “Today, perhaps, all Ukrainian print media have a hard time, and we are no exception,” says Inna Mykhailivna. “When the dollar rose, printing services also became more expensive. I don’t blame the printing houses – those in Zaporizhzhia also work in very difficult conditions. These are the realities of today’s war. We had to halve the volume – from 8 to 4 pages. We optimized everything we could, including salaries and staff: we work together with our accountant Maryna Patrakey.

However, the editor emphasizes that the newspaper pays its taxes on time. And the newspaper comes out on time, every week. “We decided not to raise the price of the newspaper, given the decrease in the volume of the newspaper,” notes Inna Shvydka. “Fortunately, Ukrposhta has not increased the cost of its services, such as registration and delivery. We are holding on as best we can, given that the audience is shrinking – half of Nikopol and many from Nikopol district have left for safer regions of Ukraine. According to Inna Mykhailivna, people perceive the newspaper very well, and in the realities of the current war, its publication is considered an additional sign of stability. “It is good that the NUJU lobbied for amendments to the government’s decision on the special nature of treasury operations, which allowed us to lift the ban on government and local authorities paying for media coverage,” says Inna Shvydka. “We have normal cooperation with town and village councils.” Despite all the difficulties of the current situation, Pivdenna Zoria is still holding on and continues to publish. “The NUJU, Academy of Ukrainian Press, Swiss non-profit organization Fondation Hirondelle and Institute for Regional Media and Information (IRMI, Ukraine) help us a lot,” says Inna Shvydka. She boasts that foreign benefactors have provided the editorial office with a laptop, which allows Inna Mykhailivna to participate in the NUJU’s educational project ‘Steps to Sustainable Development’. “The computer I used to edit the newspaper didn’t have a camera, so I couldn’t participate in online events before,” she recalls. “The laptop came with a smartphone, which I can now use to create an Internet hotspot. In general, the laptop is an additional stability, as it has a battery, which is important in the conditions of shelling and power outages. We also received help from other benefactors, participated in the NUJU projects ‘We are from Ukraine!’ and ‘Journalists are important’. I am sincerely grateful to everyone for this.” Inna Shvydka says that almost no one currently advertises in the newspaper. The only thing that comes in steadily is ads about the loss of documents… During the war, many people lost their documents, and according to the law, they need to be published in the newspaper to get them restored. Realizing the problems of people, the editorial board decided not to raise the price of this service… “We have gathered our will into a fist and do not allow ourselves to relax,” emphasizes Inna Mykhailivna. “Great patriots of Ukraine usually work in newspapers like ours. We do a very important thing to hold the information front. It is important for people, and not only for the older generation: now the publication of a newspaper is a sign that ‘the situation is under control’.” ************************************************************* This story about the media was created by the NUJU in the frame of the project «Improving Ukrainian Media Resilience in Ukraine», financed by Swiss Solidarity and implemented with the support of the Swiss non-profit organization Fondation Hirondelle and the Institute for Regional Media and Information (IRMI, Ukraine). Fondation Hirondelle and IRMI implement a project of institutional support for Ukrainian media editorial offices in the east, north and south of our country, with an emphasis on the local press. They also launched a 10-month support program for 18 media.