Uladzimir Matskevich: I don’t know any other person who would have as many friends as Piotr Martsau

photo from Piotr Martsau's page on facebook

On September 13 Piotr Martsau, a founder, publisher, inspirer, and the editor-in-chief of “BDG” (“Belarusian business paper”) and “Name” passed away. Less than three weeks ago he was diagnosed with ac

Chemotherapy undermined his immune system for complications and sepsis to appear, and in less than three weeks the disease burnt Piotr Martsau from within in his 52.

Uladzimir Matskevich, the head of the Board of the International Consortium “EuroBelarus” recalls Piotr Martsau – a publisher, analytic, public figure, and just a person.

- There is no sense in a person’s universe if he doesn’t have friends.

The whole Minsk was moving in Piotr Martsau’s circle: journalists, politicians, analytics of the highest level, as well as people from the President’s administration and KBG.

Those who were visiting Martsau were also communicating with each other; and a certain club appeared, where the most complicated and important questions of the social and political life were discussed. This club emerged in Martsau’s reception room at Ploshcha Voli (Freedom Square), where the editor’s office of “BDG” (“Belarusian business paper”) used to be situated. When persecution and pressure on the independent media started, the editorship of “BDG” had to change the location.

I met Piotr Martsau in 1994 during the election campaign. I remember very well how full of energy and hopes for the future we used to be. Once Piotr called on my hotel (I didn’t have my own flat then and used to live in a hotel), and we watched election speeches of the presidential candidates and were discussing them. At that time we were absolutely unaware that the campaign will ruin all our hopes, we didn’t know that our energy will be spent not on our plans, but on a fight with the regime establishing before our very eyes.

There was a period of six months during our 20-year friendship when we saw each other practically every day – when “Charter-97” was created. There were years when we met once a year. Our meetings happened in different regimes. Twice it was Piotr whom I called first after my arrest.

When I had some doubts regarding the analysis I performed on my own, Martsau was, perhaps, the only person with whom I could share my conclusions and find out how reasonable they were. Piotr was not only a journalist and a businessman; he also was a solid analytic. In his paper “BDG” he had all the information necessary for understanding what is happening in the country. We almost always shared the views on the situation, though sometimes our ideas as to what we should do were different. Now I won’t have anyone with whom I can check my conclusions and assumptions.

Piotr was a decent and careful person and didn’t impose his vision to anyone, taking careful stance to different initiatives, projects, and adventures.

Though knowing the situation thoroughly, Piotr never turned into a pessimist, as he had a very stable and strong character. As he used to say, even if there is vertical power, he and his team in the paper will be writing across.

It were difficult 20 years, with highs and lows. But for some people the bottom that he reached was the top of the hills.

Without a little media-holding that Piotr had created Belarus’s media area looks nothing but deformed and inferior – the school and workshop for education of personnel, a club, where new ideas were born and realized now disappeared.

Piotr was the centre, the core, and the heart of the Belarusan civil society. He never limited himself with one sphere of activity, he had always been supporting other initiatives – commercial, media, civil. I don’t think that with today’s state of civic conscience our society is able to assess the scale of the loss.

Civil society is a free club of free people. And it is exactly what Martsau’s club formed around his papers and himself looked like.

I don’t know any other person who would have as many friends in Belarus as he had. I don’t think that with his active stand in life it is impossible to stay without enemies; the enemies are represented by the current regime. He might have offended someone or discriminated someone – but it is impossible not to offend someone with such a high level of his business, his paper, his work; one has to change the good for the better. But I don’t know any other person who would be so rich with friends as Piotr Martsau.

The death of Piotr Martsau is a huge loss for everyone who knew him and loved him, and there are a lot of these people! But those who didn’t know him in person also lost a lot. His work is the heritage for the whole country. We won’t realize this loss for a long time.