Former PiS FM says Polish rule of law worse than Hungary

The rule of law in Poland is much worse than in Hungary, said former foreign minister Jacek Czaputowicz of the current policy of the government he used to serve.

In his op-ed published by Rzeczpospolita on Monday, Czaputowicz criticised the national referendum that the government has scheduled for the same day as the parliamentary elections, 15 October, claiming it illegal.

“Poland, just like Hungary, organises the election and referendum on the same day,” he noted, referring to the 2022 referendum in Hungary concerning LGBTQ+-related content.

However, the situation in Poland “is much worse,” he said, expressing regret “that we do not have Budapest here.”

Polish election law is marked by “structural violence,” which makes it “more reprehensible from the point of view of democracy than the rightfully criticised Hungarian system,” Czaputowicz argued, adding that this would undoubtedly influence the elections’ international assessment.

PiS ‘criminal under its own laws’

As in Hungary, the combination of elections and a referendum in Poland serves to impose certain themes on the pre-election debate and draw additional attention to the ruling camp’s campaign, he said.

However, there are significant differences between the two countries’ electoral systems. In Hungary, there were separate lists of voters for the elections and the referendum, and invalid votes were not included in the turnout.

In Poland, invalid votes are also counted, so the only way to oppose the referendum is to abstain. In addition, there will be a common electoral roll for both the elections and the referendum, making it impossible to separate the turnout of the two votes, thus preventing the referendum from being non-binding.

Czaputowicz quoted an opinion by Jerzy Kwaśniewski, a member of the pro-government ultra-conservative legal organisation Ordo Iuris, which monitored the referendum in Hungary. If a sufficient turnout is a requirement for the referendum to be binding, Kwaśniewski says it must not be artificially inflated.

“Every citizen has the right to an accessible vote in elections and a separate decision to vote in a referendum,” he wrote, adding that “refusing to take a ballot paper or damping it facilitates falsification”.

According to Polish Ombudsman Marcin Wiącek, also quoted in Czaputowicz’s article, a voter who refuses to take a ballot paper may feel uncomfortable, which would mean they may be afraid to vote according to their intentions.

This could mean violating Poland’s penal code, which punishes “using the relationship of dependence” to force people to vote a certain way, the former minister added.

“The Polish state no longer protects the right of citizens to vote secretly so that they can vote according to their free will, undisturbed by external factors. It is using structural violence, exploiting citizens’ fears of real or potential repression,” Czaputowicz argued, calling the state apparatus “a criminal under the law it has established”.

Czaputowicz, a political scientist and professor at Warsaw University, served as foreign minister in the PiS government between 2018 and 2020, a period in which Poland was already in conflict with EU institutions over several issues, the most serious being the controversial judicial reforms.

PiS isolates Poland in Europe, Poles believe

Earlier this summer, the leader of the ruling conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party, Jarosław Kaczyński, announced a referendum on accepting migrants under the EU’s proposed migration and asylum reform. Poland and Hungary were the only countries to reject the new solutions.

Later, the government added three more questions. From the beginning, the opposition criticised the referendum, especially for the wording of the questions, which suggested the right answers for the government.

The questions that Poles will be asked on 15 October concern the reception of irregular migrants, dismantling the wall on the border with Belarus, privatisation of state assets and raising the retirement age.

“It is a political plebiscite. Little does PiS care about Polish people’s minds, it only focuses on building appropriate political narratives and concentrating on the topics it finds convenient,” opposition centrist Civic Platform (PO) MP Michał Szczerba told EURACTIV.pl.

Ryszard Legutko, PiS MEP and co-leader of the European Conservatives and Reformists Party, responded that the referendum concerns the problems that are crucial for the Polish people and any decisions that would be taken based on it may be reversed once the current opposition comes to power.

Meanwhile, 53% of Poles are concerned that PiS’ international policy may lead Poland to isolation from the EU, according to the poll by Kantar Institute for TVN private broadcaster. 41% hold an opposite view.

(Aleksandra Krzysztoszek | EURACTIV.pl)