The incident with the hanging poster at the Poznan stadium was long awaited - after all, currently reporters lack any kind of topics. Compared to this event, other news received far less attention and caused little debate. For instance, last year in London were heard "Heil Hitler!" shouts and other similar products created by the natives. But in order to make the Poznan incident this holiday's loudest hit, the mass media quickly and effectively used the opportunity to do so. The mutual apologies and love confessions – were seen as too little. In order to extend the Poznan incident for as long as possible, the topic started to be examined in already tested way: striking theEAPL party and its leader ValdemarTomaševski. It seemed as if this political party and all Lithuanian Poles had something in common with the Poznan incident. Party's press office statement and the assumptions set out in it which covered the true causes of the event and the fairmass media criticism ofTV programs, the Internet portals and newspapers, hasonly caused the hysteria and the new wave of defamation, this time openly addressed against the Electoral Action of Poles in Lithuania and its President.
Many of us might wonder why hooligans' outrage at the stadium has caused such lasting echoes? Shortly after the statement was published on the EAPL website, "unknown persons" broke into it making the web page unavailable for some period of time. Well, the truth will always face starvation. We also know that this is the first time when the secondary themes in Lithuanian media evolve into high-level events. This, however, cannot be only explained by a limited journalists' imagination and curiosity, as this time it was done purposefully. It is not important what and who was able to hurt national feelings - more important is that it was a great opportunity to direct all the post-poster hysteria in the desired way, i.e. traditionally against the Polish national minorities in Lithuania.
People have to look for the fair reason of insidiously action among the politicians who clearly do not like Polish community's entrenchment in Lithuanian political scene. The Conservative parties and their allies cannot put up with the increasing support for the Electoral Action of Poles in Lithuania, which (the support) more and more Lithuanians notice too. Increasing party's authority, as a fair advocate of the population'sinterests, has become a real obstacle to return to the power. Currently, not only the Vilnius region, but also Žemaitija residents have came to the conclusion that the country's future depends on such parties as the EAPL. No wonder that the opposing parties are making use of every opportunity and with the help of mass media,organize defamation campaigns. The latter event clearly shows that it was a thought out and organized provocation. Who can believe that countless stadium guards will not notice a huge 50-meter poster?
For almost 20 years the EAPL policies have beenstructured to bring together residents of all nationalities and, as a result, unite the state. Unlike the EAPL party, the Conservative ideological leaders with Landsbergis ahead have often tried to divide the society into "us" and "them". During the previous term of office, the Conservative party could not boast with the achievements in the field of public administration and could not handle the observation of the positive work being done by the new coalition. As rightly pointed out by Tomaševski: "Continuous and absurd repetition of words in the poster is exactly what provocateurs need."
Therefore, in order to identify the real initiators of this shameful provocation it is enough to take a closer look at those who lead the swelling of anti-Polish hysteria and then have a thought of for whom it is actually useful? In this campaign, there was no lack of media that supported the Conservatives and Liberals. Unfortunately, the campaign "Lithuania loves Poland", which in principle is very welcomed, became popular on populist attributes. For example, during the show at the radio station 'ZnadWilii'the Conservative party member Adomėnas said very pleasing words about this campaign. However, unless the words follow a deed, i.e. the problem of Poles in Lithuania is solved, they will be just empty words.
It is not difficult to find examples of journalists' subjectivity. Much closer to Vilnius region and not in Poznan, in Molėtai forests, rather a large so-called patriotic youth group again tested its strength. The "innocent youngsters' game" and its culmination this time did not ended only with a "Lithuania for Lithuanians" parade, but with the public burning of uncomfortable politicians' (that are those politicians that jamboree participants describe asharmful for the state) portraits and listening to the most favourite group that invited to fight against them. Back then it was hard to hear politicians and media developers loudly expressing their dissatisfaction and condemnation, with the exception of the campaign victims. Well, probably the youth rally with signs of fascism cannot be the state's threat and cannot be compared to the hanging poster in Poznan stadium. Moreover, it was not a provocation, but only an open expression of patriotism, so for some media outlets, that actively seekto create false tensions, is not an interesting topic, even during holidays, where nothing interesting happens.
Česlava Pačkovska
