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Faced with tough competition to win over audiences, an Albanian TV channel is taking a literal approach towards giving viewers the \u201cnaked\u201d truth \u2014 by employing almost-topless newsreaders.<\/p>\n
Wearing open jackets and nothing underneath, the young women reading the headlines on Zjarr TV are an unprecedented sight in the conservative Balkan country, where they first appeared on television and Internet screens last year.<\/p>\n
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<\/figure>\n<\/div>\nThe channel\u2019s owner says audiences haven\u2019t stopped growing since.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn Albania, where the news is manipulated by political powers, the audience needed a medium that would present the information like it is \u2014 naked,\u201d Zjarr TV owner Ismet Drishti told AFP.
\n\u201cWe don\u2019t sell sex, we reproduce the news as it is. It\u2019s both symbolic and good publicity,\u201d said Drishti, who plans to launch French and English language bulletins with \u201cbare information\u201d following the same model.<\/p>\n
For 24-year-old presenter Greta Hoxhaj, working in a state of near undress has proved to be a shortcut to glory.
\n\u201cI worked hard for five years in local television where I remained unnoticed,\u201d a cheerful and relaxed Hoxhaj told AFP in the studio, while her face was made up for the cameras.<\/p>\n
\u201cI regret nothing \u2014 in the space of three months I became a star.\u201d<\/p>\n
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<\/figure>\n<\/div>\nEvery evening at 7:30pm, Hoxhaj reads the news in a revealing and preferably pink jacket, but she was quick to point out that she dresses like other women of her age in everyday life.<\/p>\n
Her stripped down look \u201cis only for television, for information,\u201d said the presenter, who also studies law and psychology when she\u2019s not in the studio.<\/p>\n
Hoxhaj\u2019s newfound fame has landed her a job offer in Sydney as a presenter for a soon-to-launch Australian TV channel \u2014 paying 3,000 euros ($3,280) a week, and requiring her to present the news topless.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have not decided yet, I\u2019m still in discussions,\u201d said Hoxhaj.<\/p>\n
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<\/div>\n<\/div>\nPreceding her in the anchor job was Enki Bracaj, a 21-year-old student, whose bare bulletins went viral in the Balkans and made international headlines.<\/p>\n
Officially she left because she was unhappy with her salary, but according to her colleagues, she managed to land a job as a model at a fashion magazine.<\/p>\n
Zjarr TV is not the only place where female anchors have gone bare \u2014 in Venezuela, for example, a presenter on a news website stripped naked last year to toast her country\u2019s success in the Copa America football championships.<\/p>\n
But in traditional Albania, home to a mostly Muslim population of about three million, the risque presenting style has caused a stir on Facebook and other social media sites.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s pathetic to have accepted such a thing just to be on screen,\u201d wrote one online critic, while another said the move was \u201coutrageous\u201d and \u201cdisgustingly sexist\u201d.<\/p>\n
But Hoxhaj said she was not affected by such reactions, insisting: \u201cI had the courage to do what I do and now I\u2019m a star.\u201d<\/p>\n
Aside from social networks, Zjarr TV has incited little reaction from feminist groups or journalist associations in Albania.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a diversity of choice and everyone is free to change channel,\u201d said Leonard Olli, a journalist and PR specialist in the capital Tirana.<\/p>\n
Aleksander Cipa, President of the Union of Albanian Journalists, said Zjarr TV\u2019s tactics did little to help traditional news outlets as they struggle with declining audiences and sales.<\/p>\n
\u201cNudity cannot resolve the crisis in the media, which will serve anything to the public to survive,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n