sexta-feira, 20 de maio de 2016

Warsaw boils at Commission intervention


Warsaw boils at Commission intervention
This is a sad day for Polish democracy,’ Poland’s prime minister tells parliament.
Brussels will never win this fight with Poland” — Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s prime minister

By JAN CIENSKI 5/20/16, 2:20 PM CET Updated 5/20/16, 2:29 PM CET

WARSAW — The European Commission’s unexpectedly tough line over Poland’s constitutional crisis sparked a political firestorm in Warsaw Friday.

Frans Timmermans, the Commission’s first vice president, has prepared a hard-hitting opinion that will be sent to Warsaw on Monday unless the government moves rapidly to defuse the standoff over the country’s top constitutional court. Poland’s Rzeczpospolita newspaper got a look at the opinion, which says democratic standards aren’t being followed in Poland and that in the absence of a functioning Constitutional Tribunal democracy and respect for fundamental rights are in danger.

The opinion also reminds Poland that it is a member of the EU and as such is committed to the rule of law, Rzeczpospolita reported.

The hard-hitting opinion provoked a defensive reaction from the governing right-wing Law and Justice party.

Brussels will never win this fight with Poland” — Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s prime minister
“Do you want Poles to decide about Poland?” Prime Minister Beata Szydło said in a fiery speech to the parliament on Friday morning that was frequently interrupted by catcalls and yells from the opposition benches. “The Polish government will subject itself only to the will of the Polish people.”

Spreading the blame

Szydło blamed the Constitutional Tribunal for the crisis, calling it “an institution tangled up in politics,” and went on to say that “the EU makes sense when a country is respected and is a partner. That’s the kind of partnership we’re fighting for. It’s not Poland which has a problem with the EC, it’s the EC which has the problem.”

The opposition went on the attack, with one MP warning that Szydło faces possible prosecution for not obeying a verdict issued by the Constitutional Tribunal, while Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, leader of the opposition Polish People’s Party, cautioned that the government was leading the country to the brink of “civil war.”

The tribunal ruled in March that a new law, rushed through parliament dramatically changing the way the tribunal functions, violated the constitution. However, Szydło’s office has refused to acknowledge that verdict, and is also ignoring subsequent rulings issued by the tribunal.

President Andrzej Duda, allied to Law and Justice (PiS), has refused to swear in three tribunal justices elected by the previous parliament — another issue highlighted by the Commission as problematic.

The fight over the tribunal has united the fractious opposition, still reeling from the overwhelming defeat it suffered at the hands of PiS in October. It has also brought tens of thousands of anti-government protesters onto the streets, and tainted Poland’s international image.

PiS has long been suspicious of the tribunal — which rules on the constitutionality of laws passed by parliament — blaming it for blocking some of its initiatives during its previous 2005-2007 stint in power.

Brussels moves

The Commission launched an unprecedented rule of law procedure against Poland in January, and since then has been conducting talks with the government.

Despite being given five months, the government hasn’t moved decisively to end the crisis. Jarosław Kaczyński, the PiS leader and Poland’s most powerful politician, has suggested compromises that include rewriting the constitution and finding roundabout procedures to seat the unrecognized justices, but those ideas haven’t found favor with the opposition.

The worry is that the government is simply playing for time while it waits until the end of the year, when the term of Andrzej Rzepliński, the tribunal’s chief justice, expires. That would allow the government to choose a new tribunal president more to its liking, ending the crisis on its own terms.

The Commission has evidently lost patience with Warsaw. Earlier this week, Timmermans was authorized by his fellow commissioners to send the opinion to Warsaw on Monday unless there is a resolution.

There’s no chance of that happening.

“The Monday deadline is an unachievable deadline,” government spokesman Rafał Bochenek told reporters.

If Timmermans sends the opinion, Warsaw then has two weeks to respond.

If the Commission doesn’t find that answer satisfactory, it can issue a “rule of law recommendation,” identifying the problem and giving Poland a fixed amount of time to resolve it.

The Commission then monitors follow-up. If that still doesn’t work, the Commission, the European Parliament or 10 member countries could launch an “Article 7 procedure,” which first issues a formal warning and then could impose sanctions and suspend a country’s EU voting rights.

That would have to be backed by all 27 other EU countries, and Hungary, which has its own problems with the Commission, has made clear it will defend its Polish ally.

“In Brussels they can think that they’re big boys, but Brussels will never win this fight with Poland,” Viktor Orbán, Hungary’s prime minister, told Hungarian radio on Friday.

Authors:

Jan Cienski  

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