Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) -- The Chilanzar court today completed hearings and ruled on an administrative case on non-disclosure of affiliation and conflict of interest in the public procurement process in the manner prescribed by public procurement legislation. 

Director General of the Cinematography Agency Firdavs Abdukhalikov will pay a fine of 30 sizes of basic estimated value in the manner prescribed by law in accordance with Article 175-8 (violation of the legislation on public procurement) of Part 4 of the Code of Administrative Liability.

Earlier, on 27 January, Abdukhalikov already took part in the hearing of the case and answered in detail the questions of interest to the court.

The court took into account the information previously provided by Firdavs Abdukhalikov and his lawyer B. Mukadamov, in particular, that the state order for the creation of serials was placed not only on the Sevimli TV channel, as it was presented in some media, but also on other non-state TV channels. The information emphasized that the filming of national television series by the Cinematography Agency was carried out in cooperation with non-state television channels. More than 15 projects were officially submitted to the Cinematography Agency from non-state TV channels - MY5, Zor-TV and Sevimli-TV. 

The decision to shoot television series was not made solely by the general director of the agency, but by two councils at once - an artistic council approved by the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Uzbekistan, and an expert one. Three projects were selected from the submitted projects by the Councils of the Agency - “Kodirkhon” (120 episodes, MY5 TV channel, 1.7 billion soums), “Najotkorlar” (63 episodes, Zor-TV channel, 1.8 billion soums) and “Tuzok” (120 episodes, Sevimli-TV channel, 1.8 billion soums).

In addition, the artistic council of the Agency decided to launch the television series Orzular Palatasi (about the heroism of healthcare professionals). Financing was provided to the private studio My Films LLC in the amount of 1.5 billion soums. The broadcast was planned on the Sevimli-TV channel. These funds, due to the current situation, were also returned by the My Films studio to the state budget.

It was emphasized that for non-state TV channels, these joint projects had, first of all, a priority social component. For example, the series "Tuzok" was created in partnership with the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and the TV series "Najotkorlar" was created jointly with the Ministry of Health, the purpose of which is to tell viewers about the hard work of law enforcement officials and the healthcare system.

The Government allocated 12 billion soums to the Cinematography Agency. However, as a result of negotiations with TV channels, an agreement was reached on co-production and joint financing. Thus, these projects for the agency of cinematography have passed into the status of investment. 50 percent of the funds were allocated by the agency, and the other half was funded by TV channels. The Cinematography Agency considered such a mechanism of work as co-production, that is, as an attraction of private funds from TV channels and additional investment in the industry. It was at this stage that a legal error occurred due to the lack of a lawyer in the agency. Director General Firdavs Abdukhalikov did not notify the Ministry of Finance of a possible affiliation and conflict of interest in the public procurement process, as he considered these projects primarily as investment projects and tried to cut the costs of the state part by half.

Last year alone, the Cinematography Agency implemented a number of partnership projects with investment funds, including with foreign film studios in the amount of US$4 million, 7 joint projects were created with domestic private studios in the amount of 3.9 billion soums, eight projects were built in Tashkent, Samarkand and Bukhara modern cinemas for a total of about US$10 million. In this vein, joint filming of series with TV channels is also additional extra-budgetary funds, without which the development of the film industry in the country is not possible.

At the same time, the funds received by the Sevimli-TV channel from the Cinematography Agency for the production of the Tuzok series were transferred in full to the address of the private studio Umid Production, designated by the Cinematography Agency as a production studio. The TV channel also paid its share of 50% to the above-mentioned production studio. After the release of the official statement of the Anti-Corruption Agency, the TV channel decided to fully refund the funds for the Tuzok series, despite the fact that the filming of the first season of the television series was completed and the series went on the air in January of this year.

The agency has nothing to do with the highly publicized television series Sabriya, as well as with many other series produced by private studios.

As Director General of the Cinematography Agency Firdavs Abdukhalikov noted, “we are at the initial and very important stage of establishing the production of national Uzbek television series. This is a very important stage for every country, and it is not always easy, as it takes time, experience and infrastructure. We all remember that back in 2020, non-state TV channels showed mainly foreign series. Now the situation has changed and each private channel mainly broadcasts national television series. However, often the quality leaves much to be desired and this causes fair criticism from the public. At the same time, I regret the legal error that occurred due to the absence of a competent lawyer in the Agency at the time the decision was made. We will take measures to strengthen the legal service of our Agency and prevent such violations in the future.”

In the course of today’s trial, lawyer B. Mukadamov asked the court to take into account the information that there was no mercenary intent in Abdukhalikov’s actions, decisions regarding the filming of serials and the distribution of state funds were taken collectively by the artistic and expert councils of the Agency, the series was filmed and aired, projects were investment and allowed saving 50% of the total amount allocated by the state, the funds were distributed to three rating non-state channels almost in equal shares, and also the fact that the amounts allocated by the cinematography agency in favor of television series were returned to the state budget in full.

Currently, the Cinematography Agency is developing a program of systemic measures to shoot serials and improve their content, and in the near future proposals will be submitted to the government for consideration.