Vox Populi: Kotryna Stankutė-Jaščemskienė from Vilnius, Lithuania

1. What are your expectations/hopes from these elections?

That the elected representatives of each country will be motivated to contribute to the future of the united and economically strong Europe, while representing the agendas of their own countries. On the other hand it is very important that the elected representatives would stay in close touch with the state citizens, reporting and informing about their role in  policy making, communicating about the processes in EU Parliament to attract attention of the people who are now mostly are not interested in as they don’t understand how this all works.

2. Do you/people in your member state still have faith in the EU to deliver?

At least Lithuania is very much pro-EU and majority of the population is in fair of the current instabilities challenging the status quo of this union – Brexit, populistic candidate at the Presidential elections, protests. Since our country was accepted to EU family, the excitement of being part of it maybe shrank because people got used to the perks of membership, funding etc, but the appreciation and understanding of the benefits being in “the family” is clearly here. On the other hand the interest of our nation in EP elections is pretty low, recent research shows, as people lack of knowledge how does European Union works in terms of policy making, voice of each country and our agenda there. Passive participation voting might be effected by the thinking that EP elections don’t have any impact on Lithuania, as elected representatives leave to Brussels and will have no connections to the home country.

3. Will you be voting? If so, who for (if you are willing to say)?

Yes, not sure yet. I have to admit that I usually review the candidates and their programs a week or few before going to vote. Most of the personalities who are candidates I follow through the year anyways, so will not have problems to make my mind.

4. Tell us some very brief persona/biographical details about yourself?

I run non profit foundation of the phylantrop Marius Jakulis Jason. We are aiming to attract talents to start business in Lithuania, come to continue accademic career and teach contributing to the growth of the country. Before I was a Director of “Global Lithuanian Leaders”, a high impact non-profit platform of Lithuania connected international professionals, building global opportunities for Lithuania.

I seek to connect talented Lithuanians around the world bringing their expertise, knowledge, and contacts to the home country for a change. Previously, I spent two years in Singapore at the Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF), Public Affairs Department and one year as the Marketing Coordinator at the Limkokwing University of Creative Technologies in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Today I have 15 years of experience working with international project management, team management, marketing and public relations in business, non-profit and governmental sectors.