MONEY FROM BRUSSELS IN SERIOUS DANGER Negotiations on the disbursement of money from the Reconstruction Fund are dragging on in Brussels. Representatives of the European Commission are bringing the issue of the primacy of European Union law in Poland to a head.
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russels has admitted outright that it is blocking the payment of billions of euros to Poland. Paolo Gentiloni, the EU commissioner for economic affairs, attended an MEP hearing on the Reconstruction Fund and the state of implementation of National Recovery Plans (NRPs) in individual EU countries. Asked about the reasons for the protracted negotiations with Poland on its draft NRP submitted at the beginning of May, Gentiloni explained that the ongoing discussions concern, “as the Polish authorities are well aware,” the question of the supremacy of EU law and the possible consequences of this matter on the Polish NRP. European Commission Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis added that the funds will not be released until Brussels says Poland has met European requirements. The sums in question are to play a key role in the return of the Polish economy onto a path of stable growth, according to statements by representatives of the Polish authorities headed by the prime minister. The money at stake is 57 billion euros. It is therefore not surprising that the words of the EU commissioners caused a violent reaction of the most important Polish politicians from the ruling camp. “No one will lecture us on what democracy and the rule of law are, because Poland has a very long and noble history of fighting all kinds of totalitarianisms and despots,” Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki wrote on Facebook. “We fought for the rule of law and democracy during the terrible years of communism, but we have a much longer tradition of democracy and we don’t want to be lectured by anyone from Western Europe about what democracy is, what the rule of law is, because we know it best,” reads the prime minister’s post. “Such an aggressive, pushy and blackmailing demand to disregard the order of the Constitutional Tribunal from 2011 and to thereby violate the Polish Constitution in a deliberate manner, and to make it a condition for the payment of the 20
Autumn 2021
JAROSŁAW KACZYŃSKI’S IRRESPONSIBLE AND FOOLISH POLICY IS CAUSING DRAMATIC DAMAGE TO POLAND AND ALL POLES European funds due to us, is an absolute scandal as far as the action of a European official is concerned. He said something, clearly without thinking first. This happens. Sometimes people say the wrong thing,” commented Zbigniew Ziobro, Poland’s minister of justice. “I hope that the European Commission will back down and apologize,” he added. “The commissioner has undoubtedly overstepped his remit,” Zbigniew Kuźmiuk, MEP from the ruling Law and Justice party (PiS), commented on Poland’s public television channel TVP, adding that his information suggests that European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen was said to be astonished by Gentiloni’s statement. “The procedure for adopting the NRP has no connection with other EU procedures. The EC has not taken any decision to reject the NRP or suspend the measures. Paolo Gentiloni only expressed the obvious position of respecting EU law. The resulting media messages are an overinterpretation of these words,” said Waldemar Buda, deputy minister in the Ministry of Funds and Regional Policy. The Polish government hopes the EC will approve Poland’s NRP in September, Buda added. Government spokesThe Warsaw Voice
