ANALYSIS: 2023, the year Tomio Okamura disappeared from official reports on extremism in the Czech Republic

In the most recent report for the year 2023, however, even an attentive reader will search in vain for any mention whatsoever of Okamura. Why is that?

Why is this some sad news, whatever the explanation? It’s as if one were reading two descriptions of one and the same phenomenon, each of which draws an absolutely different conclusion.

You can judge for yourselves. In its annual “Report on Extremism and Prejudiced Hatred on the Territory of the Czech Republic” for the year 2022, the Interior Ministry wrote this:

Xenophobic populist politicians and activists have long demonstrated a high degree of flexibility in their search for subject matter, or rather, for enemies. Among many of them it was possible to trace their smooth transition from criticizing alleged Islamization to criticizing alleged “COVID totalitarianism”. As of March, that subject was put on the back burner and replaced by the conflict in Ukraine. In this most recent case, the pro-Kremlin narratives are being taken up with ever-increasing intensity and are even more unambiguous. The Freedom and Direct Democracy movement, the entity that so far has no competition on the scene in that regard, has also undergone this development. The movement has anxiously guarded its dominant position there. It was the only “patriotic” entity to succeed in the local elections. It was the only such entity that managed to nominate a presidential candidate, Jaroslav Bašta, through its votes in the lower house.

What about the year 2023? The report says traditional extremist parties are on the decline.

Anti-system movements now dominate the scene. That was the headline the Interior Ministry gave to its press release about the fact that the Government on Tuesday had approved its “Report on Extremism and Prejudiced Hatred on the Territory of the Czech Republic” for 2023.

To quote that report:

In the year 2023, the trend begun during the coronavirus pandemic continued of the anti-system movement dominating the extremist scene. Its representatives do not trust the democratic system, frequently express admiration for the regime in Russia, and do not respect the state and its institutions. The subjects which the movement intentionally exploits include inflation, the energy and migration crises, Russia’s aggression in Ukraine or the conflict in the Middle East. (…) The weakness of this movement is its fragmentation and its lack of any political program. Despite this, some activists, through various pieces of disinformation and conspiracy theories, have managed to gain the trust of dissatisfied citizens, mostly those who are middle-aged and older.”

The Interior Ministry’s turnaround

What’s the difference here? The Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD) movement is missing from the report for the year 2023.

That movement and its crucial figure, Tomio Okamura, were mentioned in the annual reports on domestic extremism from 2015 to 2022. The HlídacíPes.org group described that in this article, published in English on Romea.cz: https://romea.cz/en/opinion/analysis-from-populist-to-xenophobe-tomio-okamura-in-official-reports-on-czech-extremism

In the ministry’s report on extremism for the first quarter of 2023, however, it is possible to read the following statements:

The majority of the xenophobic groups which sprang up in reaction to the migration crisis of 2014–2015 have already lost their significance or stopped existing altogether. The only constant entity on that scene, therefore, is the Freedom and Direct Democracy movement. During the period under review it drew attention through its contacts with representatives of the Alternative für Deutschland movement, specifically its youth organization, Junge Alternative. Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution called that party a “suspicious case” in relation to right-wing extremism and has directly called its youth organization a right-wing extremist entity.

The Municipal Court in Prague rejected a lawsuit in February from the movement (the SPD) filed against the weekly RESPEKT for harming its good reputation. That media outlet had labeled the movement “fascist”.

However, in the annual report for all of 2023, the “xenophobic constant” mentioned in the first-quarter report for that year is now absent. It is not mentioned despite the fact that “inflation, the energy and migration crises, Russia’s aggression in Ukraine or the conflict in the Middle East” were among the favorite subjects of Okamura & Co. during 2023.

Bad reports

What explains this? The first-instance District Court for Prague 7 decided in April, in a ruling that has yet to take effect, that the state should apologize to the SPD for the fact that the Interior Ministry report for 2020 associates it with prejudiced hatred and xenophobia by stating, among other things, that the most significant group among the “extremist groups with a dominant xenophobic element” is exactly the SPD.

Could Okamura’s “removal” from the annual reports on extremism be due to his sudden “improvement”? There is no indication of that from his public actions and appearances, not this year or last year.

Or is this “preliminary caution”, i.e., the fear that the state will lose authority in this regard and subsequently have to apologize? That sounds much more likely.

If the latter explanation applies, then we are witnessing some sad news, in any regard. Either the Czech state has, for many long years, unjustifiably tarnished an innocent man by labeling him a “populist” or a “xenophobe”, or the officials of that state are incapable of describing “populist” or “xenophobic” behavior such that the courts won’t come down on them later.

This article was first written in Czech for the Ústav Nezávislé Žurnalistiky [Institute for Independent Journalism], an independent nonprofit and registered institute involved in publishing information, journalism and news reporting. Its analyses, articles and data are equally available to all for use under predetermined conditions.