Government organised postal elections without legal basis, says Poland’s state auditor

Poland’s Supreme Audit Office (NIK) has released a report which blames top government officials, including the prime minister, for unlawfully attempting to organise presidential elections in May last year, at a cost of at least 76 million zloty.

The government has responded by saying that all decisions taken by the prime minister were “in accordance with the law”. NIK has already notified prosecutors of potential crimes committed by the boards of two state-owned companies involved in the preparations.

Last spring, with Poland in lockdown during the early stages of the coronavirus pandemic, the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party pushed for presidential elections scheduled in May to be held entirely by post.

However, the government began organising the vote before relevant legislation had been passed by parliament. Last year, a court ruled that, by doing so, the prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, had committed a “gross violation of the law”. He is contesting that ruling.

Eventually, after a dispute within the ruling coalition, the government scrapped the idea of holding the vote in May, and the elections were instead delayed until the summer.

Today, NIK – a state body responsible for auditing public spending – released a report that also found that the government “lacked a legal basis” for its decision to prepare for a mail-in ballot. “The only entity authorised to organise elections was the National Electoral Commission,” wrote NIK.

Marian Banaś, the head of NIK, said at a press conference this morning that the prime minister had acted against the legal advice of experts from his chancellery and the prosecutor’s office. Instead, external opinions to the contrary were ordered at a cost of 150,000 zloty.

NIK also concluded that the organisation of the postal ballot lacked “oversight” from the government, leading to “a lack of planning” and “chaos” which put the Polish postal office, Poczta Polska, and state-owned Polish Security Printing Works (PWPW) – which was in charge of printing ballot cards – at risk of “real losses”.

“When making a decision that will be charged to the state budget, one must estimate how much it will cost. Unfortunately, there were no such estimates,” said Bogdan Skwarka, a NIK official. The auditor estimates total costs at over 76 million zloty (€17 million).

NIK also noted that there had been a breach of GDPR data protections as the post office did not have the right to request and process voters’ data. Earlier this year, a court ruled that the digitisation ministry had unlawfully transferred the personal data of Polish voters to the post office ahead of the election.

Banaś added that he had already notified prosecutors of potential crimes committed by the boards of Poczta Polska and PWPW. Earlier this year, the two entities were awarded 56 million zloty in state compensation for costs accrued in organising the abandoned elections.

The chief auditor added that there could be further notifications concerning wrongdoing by government officials after NIK analyses statements in response to its audit. These have already been submitted by the prime minister’s office and the state assets ministry, but not yet from the interior ministry.

In response to NIK’s report, the government’s information centre (CIR) issued a statement saying that “all decisions on the commencement of technical preparations for postal voting” were “legal” according to “many legal opinions”.

CIR explained that the prime minister had “never called for presidential elections or voting by correspondence”, but rather had sought to enable eligible voters “endangered due to the pandemic” to participate in the vote.

The government thus argued that Morawiecki “upheld the constitution” through “activities aimed at holding elections within the constitutional deadline”.

Earlier on Thursday, the minister for state assets, Jacek Sasin told Polskie Radio that he is “absolutely convinced we will be able to defend our position”.

“I will continue to argue that the preparations made by the government…were completely legal,” said Sasin, who added that he treated NIK’s report “as a certain element of the dispute between the government” and Banaś.

Banaś was once a minister in the PiS-led government but has become embroiled in a dispute with the ruling party since becoming head of NIK in 2019. Soon after his appointment, he resisted calls from Morawiecki to resign over allegations of wrongdoing, including claimed links to a criminal group.

Anti-corruption officials recently raided Banaś’s son’s apartment for a second time, with his father claiming it is part of a “smear campaign” aiming to remove him from his position as a government watchdog.

Banaś has himself been investigated by the Central Anticorruption Bureau (CBA) over his personal wealth, including a property that was reportedly used as a brothel. He has also been investigated in connection with his subordinates at the finance ministry, who have been charged with VAT fraud.

Today’s report on the postal elections was originally meant to be published on 18 May, but NIK had unexpectedly brought forward its release without stating a reason.

Main image credit: Slawomir Kaminski / Agencja Gazeta

Maria Wilczek

Maria Wilczek is deputy editor of Notes from Poland. She is a regular writer for The Times, The Economist and Al Jazeera English, and has also featured in Foreign Policy, Politico Europe, The Spectator and Gazeta Wyborcza.