Suicide of Polish MP’S son, 15, triggers backlash against state
THE suicide of a Polish MP’S son has prompted a furious row in the country, with the government under fire over his outing as the victim of a paedophile by a state-owned radio station.
Magdalena Filiks, an MP with Civic Platform, Poland’s largest opposition party, revealed on Friday that her son, Mikolaj, 15, had killed himself last month. Mikolaj’s death followed a report by Radio Szczecin, a state-owned local radio station, that identified him as a victim in a sexual abuse case in which the perpetrator was a former Civic Platform member and local govern- ment election candidate.
Polish law prohibits the naming of child abuse victims but Tomasz Duklanowski, the journalist behind the report, appeared to circumvent the law by giving the victim’s age and saying that he was the child of a local MP. These details made it easy to identify Mikolaj. Ms Filiks’s revelation caused outrage in Poland, with much of the anger directed at Law and Justice, the dominant party in the governing coalition, owing to the belief that Mikolaj was identified to harm his mother.
Under Law and Justice, Poland’s state-owned media has come under increased government control and is seen by some as a vehicle to do its bidding. The Polish Society of Journalists said that “Poland’s public media serves as a propaganda tool” for the state, although the government denies this, arguing instead it has brought balance to news coverage.
Reacting to the suicide, Donald Tusk, a former Polish prime minister and leader of Civic Platform, said: “We will hold Law and Justice to account for all the villainy, for all the human harm and tragedy they have caused.”
Adam Bodnar, a former human rights ombudsman, said that “Mikolaj Filiks had been murdered by the Law and Justice media regime”, while Szymon Holownia, another opposition politician, said there would be a “time of reckoning for those whose words bring death”.
Government supporters have accused the opposition of exploiting the tragedy for their own political benefit. “The very people who shout so loudly about the fight against paedophilia are hiding that there are paedophiles in their ranks,” Przemysław Czarnek, the education minister, told TVP, the stateowned television network.
Prosecutors in the north-west city of Szczecin said they are investigating the death but it is not clear if the investigation is into whether or not the journalist “incited or assisted in a suicide”.