Lithuanian newspapers in need of a makeover

Gone are the good old days for Lithuanian papers, when there was a president whose main financial backer was a Russian businessman and the mayor of Vilnius waged bitter skirmishes with the economy minister on the front pages. Editors were up to their necks in scandalous copy, and journalists had a ball lapping up the vox-pops from opposition politicians and outraged voters.

But then, in a sequential torrent beginning in 2004, the president (Rolandas Paksas) was impeached, the Russian businessman (Yuri Borisov) disgraced and stripped of his Lithuanian citizenship and the mayor (Arturas Zuokas) voted out of office. Even the Russian-born economy minister (Viktor Uspaskich), a millionaire who made his fortune selling pickles, fled to Moscow after Lithuanian prosecutors opened a probe into alleged malfeasance. He hasn’t returned.

Under the Baltic state’s new leadership, the scandals have subsided. For ordinary Lithuanians, this is a welcome break after months of mud-slinging. For media owners, it’s back to "business as usual".

Unfortunately, media watchers are unanimous in claiming that, in Lithuania’s press at least, "business as usual" is a concept greatly flawed.

Polls suggest that public trust in Lithuania’s media - particularly newspapers - has plummeted dramatically in recent years. In May, the local branch of Trans-parency International released a survey on media transparency in which it polled more than 500 Lithuanian businessmen and the results were not very flattering.

A distressing 35% of respondents said that media representatives had hinted that they could adopt a favourable stance toward a company or firm in exchange for advertising, while 64% claimed that they could recognise paid publicity in the press.

Worse, 12% of businessmen admitted to providing payment to the press for the sake of good publicity. "This is very damaging - it as good as an admittance of guilt," says Rytis Juozapavicius, director of Transparency International Lithuania.

Popular trust in the media has fallen as well. According to a June poll by Lietuvos Rytas, the largest daily by circulation, only 38% of respondents said that they trusted the media, while 22% said they did not, with both figures moving in the wrong direction for a healthy media.

The problem of "hidden advertisements" has cast a shadow over the country’s two largest dailies by circulation - Lietuvos Rytas and Respublika. Both are locally owned but have differing philosophies. Lietuvos Rytas, for instance, is tech-savvy and pours money into developing its web page - it now has six full-time video-correspondents prowling the country for material - while Respublika has shunned the web.

Respublika, which is published in both Lithuanian and Russian, embraces controversy. Its owner, Vitas Tomkus, is a renegade in the field of journalism, and gained international notoriety in 2004 after writing a long-winded editorial in which he argued that Jews and homosexuals ruled the world. The tirade, published in four articles and accompanied by offensive caricatures, elicited worldwide condemnation.

For Tomkus, however, it was "business as usual". He survived the backlash relatively unscathed - a court fined him €870 - and went on to purchase ELTA, a top news and photo agency, and most recently a small brewery.

What’s more, the Tomkus-owned tabloid, Vakaro Zinios, continues to be ranked as Lithuania’s most read paper. The paper has a staff of seven and, without the need to maintain a website, is super-profitable. TNS Gallup, a local pollster, announced in July that the scandal-sheet boasts more than 600,000 readers, or 23% of the market. Lietuvos Rytas came in second with 20% coverage, and Respublika fourth with 7.5%.

One Vilnius University professor says that the problem with the "business as usual" approach is that there is minimal or no investigative reporting. It is too costly. Juozapavicius says that young Lithuanian journalists dream of a deep-pocketed foreign investor galloping in from the European landscape and, by launching a new paper, saving the day.

The Lithuanian media scene can, however, can boast variety. There are 334 newspapers, including 307 in Lithuanian, 19 in Russian and even one in Yiddish, according to the Lithuanian National Library. Roughly one-third are issued once a month or less frequently, but there are 14 that are printed six times a week and another seven that come out five times weekly.

Foreign ownership is minimal. The fourth most read paper, 15 Minutes, is a free daily majority owned by Norway’s Schibsted in conjunction with Lietuvuos Rytas. The two also jointly publish LT, a scandal sheet sold only on newsstands. Finally there’s Verslo Zinios, a business daily owned by Sweden’s Bonnier Group that has seen its star rise thanks to an impeccable reputation.

Reputation aside, the press is booming - advertisement revenues jumped 13% to 120 million litas (€37.8m) in 2006 - and businessmen have caught on to the profit-ability. Hermis Capital, a local investment group, recently bought Kauno Diena, a well-respected national paper despite being based in Kaunas, Lithuania’s second largest city, and Klaipeda, the eponymous paper from the country’s port town.

On 6 September the group announced it was launching a new daily paper in October - Vilniaus Diena - which will feature copious information about Lithuania’s baroque capital.

• Gary Peach is a freelance journalist based in Riga, Latvia.

Gone are the good old days for Lithuanian papers, when there was a president whose main financial backer was a Russian businessman and the mayor of Vilnius waged bitter skirmishes with the economy minister on the front pages. Editors were up to their necks in scandalous copy, and journalists had a ball lapping up the vox-pops from opposition politicians and outraged voters.