2024-04-06 14:59:56
Dalia Asanavičiūtė, one of the initiators of the referendum, chairwoman of the Commission of the Seimas and the World Lithuanian Community (PLB), claims that more and more campaign advertisements and information about the referendum are being seen. According to her, after consulting communication experts, it was decided that the most intensive campaign will take place about a month before the referendum itself.
“We have talked with communication specialists in the working group that the message will be exhausted in a couple of months. Because of this, the Government Chancellery also planned that a little more than a month after Easter, an active communicative information campaign would begin – so that it would not be exhausted, so that people would not get bored. I think that strategy is correct and I hope that it will work”, D. Asanavičiūtė told Elta.
“We drove through Kaunas, there are already billboards, Vilnius is full of billboards, it seems that on Wednesday, advertisements started running on all major televisions,” she explained.
The politician admits that for now there is a lack of more active public involvement, although, the conservative noted, politicians send messages about participation in the referendum in meetings with voters. She is not afraid of the fact that the presidential election campaign, which is gaining momentum, may overshadow the issue of the multiple citizenship referendum.
“I am in a positive mood. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have even started this initiative. I see the reactions of the residents and they are more positive. The only question is whether a sufficient number of voters will come”, noted D. Asanavičiūtė.
The opposition questions the chosen communication strategy: the situation is not optimistic
So far, there is a lack of positives in the ranks of the opposition. Observing the ongoing debates in the political arena, Lukas Savickas, a member of the “Vardan Lietuvos” Democratic Union, notices that now there is a lack of information about the referendum more than in 2019, when voters voted for the preservation of citizenship.
“I dare to compare that in 2019 there was even more of that activity. This is not optimistic”, admitted the member of the Seimas.
“But it is clear that the information field is very passive. That active campaign is sorely lacking. We really had to hear some disappointment from the leaders of the society as to how that campaign is going”, explained L. Savickas.
He also doubts the strategy chosen to communicate most intensively about the referendum just a few weeks before the vote.
“A longer campaign period would have given a more consistent message that the referendum is taking place, what the arguments are, etc.,” the MP taught.
“It will not be easy to focus all this on the very last month, when you will have to fight with other information campaigns,” said L. Savickas.
L. Kontrimas: it is not the first time that such an important referendum is allowed
Communication expert Linas Kontrimas, PhD student at Vytautas Didios University (VDU), also misses information about the referendum on multiple citizenship. He wonders why the initiators of the referendum repeat the mistakes they made before and do not pay attention to a proper communication campaign.
“This is not the first time that such an important referendum is launched just for the sake of it. He swims like he swims. What do I mean? One gets the impression that the biggest supporters of this referendum are the organizers of the referendum idea themselves. But at the state level, that idea is not supported in any way. Maybe, on occasion, someone jumped in one place or another in a sentence, but there was no detailed, meaningful campaign neither in the past nor now. This may actually give the impression that this referendum is being held in order to put a check mark on the completed works, the successful completion of which was not even planned,” commented L. Kontrimas to Eltai.
“In the same way, we can see that the phobias that are raised by some characters either out of stupidity or ignorance are not countered in any way,” he noted.
At that time, when asked whether the chosen communication strategy – campaigning and promoting the referendum in the last month before the vote – could work, L. Kontrimas said that it is difficult to assess.
“In marketing, there is such a method, the so-called hitting, when all channels and huge forces are used to spread some kind of information to the maximum. As far as I know, this is successfully done by a business. But will the state and politicians really control this process? We’ll see, it’s hard to talk for now,” he said.
“But in the background of the presidential campaign, where bigger battles will take place, to allow such important content of the referendum is simply unreasonable. Seeing as the election campaign is, we now have practically an empty airwaves. (…) Strike now, turn that circle of awareness and awareness now, so that later, before the referendum, you don’t just need to put accents. The formation of opinion on such issues does not take place in a flash – do not be deceived that people’s opinions on such constitutional issues can be influenced overnight”, observed L. Kontrimas.
ELTA reminds that on May 12 this year, during the first round of the presidential elections in Lithuania, residents will also vote in a referendum on multiple citizenship.
In the referendum ballot, it will be proposed to abandon the sentence currently written in the Constitution: “except for the individual cases provided for by law, no one can be a citizen of the Republic of Lithuania and another state at the same time”. This provision does not allow the preservation of Lithuanian citizenship after acquiring the citizenship of another state.
After the citizens decide, the detailed procedures for acquiring and losing dual citizenship would be provided by the constitutional law.
At the end of last year, a survey conducted by “Spinter Research” showed that 3 out of 4 residents of the country believe that it would be important to preserve Lithuanian citizenship after acquiring the citizenship of another state. At that time, more than half – 60 percent – planned to participate in the referendum. of the country’s population.
In order for the referendum to be considered to have taken place, more than half of the country’s citizens with the right to vote must participate in it. However, in order for the issue to be decided by the referendum to be accepted, more than half of all persons with the right to vote would have to speak for it.
2024-04-06 14:59:56