Poland’s justice minister has condemned the decision by the European Commission to launch new legal action against Poland as part of a “German plan to liquidate EU member states”.
However, the Europe minister has offered a more sanguine response, suggesting that the decision was previously expected and reassuring Poles that it will not affect efforts to unblock billions of euros in EU funds frozen due to rule-of-law concerns.
On Wednesday, the commission announced that it was taking Poland to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) because the Polish Constitutional Tribunal (TK) has rejected the primacy of EU law over the Polish constitution.
It also argued that the TK itself “no longer meets the requirements of an independent and impartial tribunal previously established by law…due to the irregularities in the appointment procedures of three judges and in the selection of its president”.
The @EU_Commission has launched further legal action against Poland.
It says that two rulings by Poland's constitutional court – which found parts of EU law to be inconsistent with the Polish constitution – "violated and challenged the primacy of EU law" https://t.co/DShAPKOBla
— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) February 15, 2023
At a press conference later in the day, justice minister Zbigniew Ziobro, who leads a hardline junior partner in Poland’s conservative ruling coalition, described the commission’s latest actions as more “threats and blackmail” against Poland.
“The aim is to recognise laws made in Poland, by Polish democracy, as not having meaning,” he declared. “This is the path to implementing a German plan to liquidate EU member states in order to create one, centralised state with the formal capital in Brussels and the real one in Berlin.”
He said that his party, United Poland (Solidarna Polska), “will never agree to sell Polish sovereignty for a piece of silver”. He is “convinced that the resistance of Polish society will grow as awareness increases of the European Commission’s aims”.
Poland’s ruling coalition has long claimed that Germany is seeking to turn the EU into a “Fourth Reich”. Such anti-German rhetoric has escalated in recent months ahead of parliamentary elections later this year.
Poles have a choice between the “Polish” ruling party and the “German” opposition led by @donaldtusk, says Jarosław Kaczyński.
"Germany’s current intention is for us to be subordinated to them. We do not want to be under anyone’s boot. We have to resist" https://t.co/MnWADW8RxU
— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) September 26, 2022
However, the minister for EU affairs, Szymon Szynkowski vel Sęk, who hails from the main ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party and has been leading the government’s negotiations with the European Commission, said that the latest development was “no surprise”.
Speaking alongside government spokesman Piotr Müller, Szynkowski vel Sęk noted that the commission began the process of launching these proceedings in December 2021 and has been in dialogue with Warsaw ever since.
“We clearly indicated that constitutional jurisprudence is the exclusive domain of the member states,” said the minister, adding that “in the past, similar positions were taken by the constitutional courts of other countries, including Germany and Spain”.
Müller, speaking later to Polskie Radio, warned that “some of the Brussels elite” are trying to expand the EU’s competencies. “It is in the interest of Poland and our citizens that constitutional law is the highest law, otherwise we lose our sovereignty.”
W państwach wskazanych na mapie TK lub SN w konkretnych sprawach wskazywały, że UE przekraczając swoje kompetencje może naruszać krajowe konstytucje, a w tych państwach konstytucje są najwyższym prawem.
Ale tylko Polska broniąca swojej konstytucji Berlinowi przeszkadza… pic.twitter.com/ejK5OHXzFF
— Sebastian Kaleta (@sjkaleta) February 15, 2023
Szynkowski vel Sęk also claimed that the EU’s proceedings in relation to Poland’s constitutional court have no relation to the separate process of Warsaw trying to unblock billions of euros in frozen funds by meeting EU demands to roll back some of its judicial reforms.
As part of those efforts, earlier this month parliament passed legislation to further reform the disciplinary system for judges. However, President Andrzej Duda subsequently referred it for assessment by the constitutional court – the very body whose legitimacy is being questioned by the commission.
“The great legal scam of the TK will be assessed by the CJEU,” tweeted Marcin Matczek, a leading legal scholar and regular critic of the government’s judicial policies.
“Again, there will be the cry of ‘sovereignty’ from PiS,” he added. “But the issue here is about the simple principle that agreements must be kept. PiS and the pseudo-TK are breaking them, and then they wonder why it brings about another disaster.”
Wielkie prawne oszustwo pt. TK Julii Przyłębskiej zostanie osądzone przez TSUE. Znowu będzie wielki krzyk PiS, że „suwerenność” – a tu chodzi o prostą zasadę, że umów się dotrzymuje. PIS i pseudoTK ją łamią, a potem się dziwią, dlaczego to przynosi kolejną katastrofę.
— Marcin Matczak (@wsamraz) February 15, 2023
Main image credit: Ministerstwo Sprawiedliwości (under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 PL)
Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.
