‘LET’S KICK RACISM OUT OF THE STADIUMS’ IN TVN TELEVISION
Racist incidents that took place on 26th of July at Korona Kolporter Kielce stadium, followed by immiediate reaction from Never Again Assoc. caused a lively debate upon the problem of rasism and nationalism in the sports’ world and possible ways of fighting it.Public discussions provoked TVN TV to broadcast a special programme covering these issues. Let me remind what acctually happened. On 25th of July manager of first league club Korona Kolporter Kielce Wieslaw Tkaczuk held a meeting with the representans of local ‘fans’. The last refused to agree with plans of transferring a Brazilian,black player - Hernani- to the club. ‘Let´s make it clear - its going to be him or us (‘fans’) - claimed one of Korona supporters - Korona is, and always was a white club. There is not a game without our transparent : ‘White pride,white honour’ and that is the oldest of ours transparents. In a 40 millions country must be at least one white defender that could play for our team. And if there is none let’s better look for him in Russia or Balkans. Club’s manager, Piotr Burlikowski refused to answer if it is possible that transfer is blocked by a group of nazi-fans.
On the 26th of July during the first game of the season, Korona Kielce vs Cracovia Krakow Hernani - eventually bought by the host team - received racist abuse. Every time he touched the ball he was getting ‘monkey taunts’ from the crowd. What is more shocking, he was abused by part of the supporters of his own team. Clubs officials reacted immiediately by critisicing the incident, providing police with pictures of nazi-fans taken during the game, and announcing that they are banned from vititing Korona’s stadium.The majority of Korona’s supporters agreed with clubs decisions and stood by brazilian player. Never Again Assoc. took a big part in the media debate, that followed the incident.
On the 30th of july, before the Korona Kolporter Kielce vs Odra Wodzislaw Slaski game pictures of 6 recognized nazi-fans were displayed at the box officces, they were banned from visiting the stadium and security stopped them from entering the stadium. Korona’s players appeared on the pitch in t-shirts with the logo of Never Again Assoc.’s campaign ‘Let´s kick the racism out of the stadiums’. Hernani was loudly applaused by the crowd each time he touched the ball.
TVN TV report was created with the help of Never Again Assoc. representatives who provided the authors with all necessary materials about the racism in the sport world. Jacek Purski, coordinating ‘Let’s kick the racism out of the stadiums campaign’, was present. Programme shows the presence and increase of racism in Polish sport life and current campaigngs aiming to combat it - among them ‘Let’s kick the racism out of the stadiums’ campaign, coordinated by the FARE network. The report was presented in ‘Uwaga!’ (‘Attention!’) programme, one of the most popular (couple of million viewers daily) intervention shows in Poland.
