Official Mass Media of Homel Launch Campaign against Local Pro-Democratic Candidates

The mouthpiece of Homel executive authorities had plenty of bright epithets for democrats: “the failure of blue revolution”, “incapacity of the opposition”, “donor tap of the Western comrades”, etc. However, the traditional stock phrases of state propagandists do not impress anyone.

That’s why Homelskaya Prauda lists about a dozen names of the democratic candidates mentioning they are officially unemployed. The newspaper’s creativity is worth citing: “In case they are elected councilors they will represent the unemployed, who are less than 2% in the country and our region. Will they represent the other 98% though?” Unfortunately, the author does not raise the issue why more than 10 democratic activists lost jobs at state companies last year in Homel.

Uladzimir Katsora, one of the “heroes” of the article and head of Homel committee “For Freedom!” points out that such articles are usually written not by journalists but by members of the state security services. The name of the author of the article is not on the list of the editorial staff. Katsora told radio Racyja he did not plan to sue the newspaper since he didn’t believe in justice in present conditions. Nevertheless, he believes the article in Homelskaya Parauda is a political action and plans to give an adequate reaction.