The Many Faces of “We can do it!“ - Taking a look at the dark version in Poland
Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel is currently risking her popularity among members of her own party (and potential voters) by assuring everyone, “We can do it!”, on the one hand thereby declaring the refugee crisis as the current priority and at the same time silencing all critics and calls to ‘stop admission of refugees’. The climate in Germany is becoming rough – Bavaria’s minister-president Seehofer has been fanning the flames for weeks by criticising the chancellor’s lead and course and calling for tightening up border controls, separate refugee camps depending on nationality, and ‘border-camps’ to enable immediate deportation of refugees whose asylum request was denied. However, he is representing a minority. Until now the majority of German politicians have taken a positive stance towards refugees. The German government was one of the main initiators calling upon the European Union to finally take measures which are able to tackle the increasing pressure on some countries by equally distributing refugees among the Union’s members. However, supporters of the initiative such as Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Greece had to face a strong headwind particularly from the Viségrad Four countries (Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary), which made a united solution almost impossible.
Especially in Poland, we can currently witness the ugly face of “We can do it!”. Beata Szydło, candidate of PiS (Prawo i Sprawiedliwości, Law and Justice) for the upcoming parliamentary elections, chose this exact slogan for her electoral campaigns, “Damy Radę” (Polish for “We can do it”). But unlike in Germany, Ms Szydło is pursuing to achieve the opposite: First of all the slogan aims at taking the power off the current government by winning the elections. And the refugee crisis is the most popular topic to gain voters and supporters. Ms Szydło is not as extreme as her party leader Jarosław Kaczyński, who claims the refugees are not looking for shelter but are only interested in sponging off the system and abusing the social welfare system. He even goes further and seems to be forfaiting the racist and discriminating language, partly reminiscent of formulations used by the Nazis. He claims there are “signs of the emergence of very dangerous diseases which haven’t been seen in Europe for a long time: cholera on Greek islands; dysentery in Vienna; various types of parasite, protozoas, which aren’t dangerous in the organisms of these people [Middle East refugees], but which could be dangerous here.” Nonetheless, the PiS candidates make use of the population’s concerns to stir up the atmosphere.
Statements like the above mentioned ones cause social tensions to rise. Especially after the member states of the European Union had agreed upon the fair and equal distribution and resettlement of refugees, and despite Poland’s hesitation at first, the country’s Prime Minister Ewa Kopacz had at last agreed to take in 7000 refugees until 2017. However, many argue Poland does not have the economic possibilities to take in refugees claiming that the majority of Poles are struggling to make ends meet. During the past couple of weeks, anti-refugee movements have gained more and more supporters with the movements’ tone at rallies becoming increasingly aggressive. In Łódź, several hooligan groups, usually fallen out with each other, marched through the streets, presenting the Nazi salute (in Poland, mind you!), chanting “Free Poland without Islam”, some of the rally attendants stating, “once the ‘Islamists’ (sic!) are here, they will not hesitate to rape our women”. In Gdansk, similar scenes were observed, the angry crowd yelling, “We will do to you [refugees] what Hitler did to the Jews”.
Countering the popular anti-immigration and anti-refugees movements seems almost impossible. But few initiatives and NGOs are yet to give up. However, they face a challenging task. Poland is the most homogenous country in the EU, only 0,1% of the population are foreigners. Additionally, almost 90% of the inhabitants are members of the Catholic Church, whose representatives are equally adding fuel to the fire by diminishing refugees of Islamic faith. The main issue is the lack of solidarity due to a lack of awareness and understanding of different cultures and religions caused by a lack of interactions between Poles and non-Poles. And this in a country where the term ‘solidarity’ (Solidarność) carries such a historical meaning and is a major part of the inhabitants’ identity.
Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons
