Polish regulator fines US-owned station for “inciting hatred” in critical documentary on priest

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Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and is published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

Poland’s broadcasting regulator has fined the country’s largest private TV station, TVN, for a documentary about controversial Catholic priest and media mogul Tadeusz Rydzyk. The National Broadcasting Council (KRRiT) claims that the programme “incited hatred and discrimination”.

The fine, amounting to 142,800 zloty (€32,883), was issued by KRRiT chairman Maciej Świrski, an appointee of the former national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS) government. PiS has close ties to Rydzyk and is highly critical of TVN, which is owned by US media conglomerate Warner Bros. Discovery.

The documentary in question, titled “29 Years of Impunity: The Phenomenon of Father Tadeusz”, aired on news channel TVN24 in 2021 and was updated and published on YouTube in 2024 under an altered title “32 Years of Impunity: The Phenomenon of Father Tadeusz”.

The report, which has been viewed over 400,000 times on YouTube alone, presents Rydzyk, founder of Catholic broadcasters Radio Maryja and TV Trwam, as having “got away with everything…never suffering real consequences” for “behaviour that has caused public outrage”.

It recalls numerous controversial statements by Rydzyk, including those with alleged antisemitic and racist overtones and seen as excusing child abuse in the church.

The documentary also notes Rydzyk’s close relationship with PiS, which ruled Poland from 2015 to December 2023. Leading PiS figures regularly appeared at Rydzyk’s events and the priest often spoke in favour of the party’s policies.

According to calculations by Wirtualna Polska, a leading news website, a total of over 380 million zloty (€87 million) was given by state institutions and state-owned companies under PiS to Rydzyk’s numerous ventures.

After TVN published the documentary on YouTube in June, a former member of the KRRiT and chair of the “Radio Maryja Support Group”, Janusz Kawecki, urged the priest’s supporters to file complaints against the station.

In a statement published on Radio Maryja’s website, Kawecki accused TVN of “spreading lies” based on “the unauthorised accusation that the priest is in possession of increasingly large amounts of property, real estate, bordering on building an ’empire'”.

As a result, a total of 2,624 complaints signed by 26,656 people were submitted to the KRRiT, announced the regulator in a statement on Thursday. It said that its analysis had found the programme used “manipulation” and “lies” in an effort to present Rydzyk “exclusively in a negative light”.

Moreover, “by inciting hatred and discrimination on the basis of religion or belief, political views or any other views”, the programme violated Poland’s broadcast law, found the KRRiT. As a result, it issued the fine of 142,800 zloty, which is 85% of the maximum penalty allowed by law.

The station now has 14 days to either pay the fine or launch an appeal. It has not yet publicly commented on the decision, but the reporter who made the documentary on Rydzyk, Rafał Stangreciak, tweeted ironically that he feels he has received “one of the most important journalistic awards of recent years”.

Under Świrski’s leadership, the KRRiT has faced accusations of disproportionately targeting media outlets critical of PiS and its allies.

Last year, it fined Radio Zet 476,000 zloty for disseminating what it called “disinformation contrary to the Polish national interest”, a decision overturned by a court this year. Similarly, a fine of 80,000 zloty against broadcaster TOK FM for how it discussed a controversial textbook introduced under PiS was invalidated by a court in July.

In March, the KRRiT fined TVN 550,000 zloty for allegedly failing to maintain “objectivity and journalistic integrity” in a documentary examining claims of neglect by Polish Pope John Paul II in addressing child sex abuse in the Catholic church. The station called the decision an attempt at censorship.

The council’s treatment of TVN has also drawn international scrutiny. In May, the US ambassador to Poland criticised the KRRiT for delays in renewing a broadcasting license for one of TVN’s channels.

Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

Main image credit: Archidiecezja Krakowska Biuro Prasowe / flickr.com (under public domain)

Alicja Ptak

Alicja Ptak is senior editor at Notes from Poland and a multimedia journalist. She previously worked for Reuters.