Polish election campaigns are fraught with resentment, but hopefully, the anti-German rhetoric will not affect Polish society, German SPD MP Sebastian Hartmann said about the campaign led by Poland’s ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party.
Hartmann referred to PiS’s new election advertisement, in which the party suggests that Berlin wants to interfere in Poland’s internal affairs, including the retirement age. The ad has sparked controversy in Poland and abroad, as anti-German sentiment has emerged as a popular theme in PiS rhetoric in recent months.
“I regret that the Polish election campaigns are deliberately charged with resentment and instrumentalised. I hope this rhetoric will not catch on and that Polish civil society will not be influenced by it,” Hartmann, who serves as Vice-Chairman of the German-Polish Parliamentary Group in the Bundestag, told Euractiv.
Germany and Poland are united by a strong bond of friendship that must continue to be cultivated in an age when Moscow pursues imperialist policies, he said.
What remains positive is that in Germany, “these resentments, except from the extreme right, are not being played out between our countries so as not to strain our relations further”, he added.
The advert, posted on the social media network X, uses satellite imagery to hone in on the German Embassy in Warsaw and the sound of Richard Wagner’s “Ride of The Valkyries” to build up a tense atmosphere as a member of the German embassy staff places a call.
“I am calling from the German embassy, and I would like to speak to the chancellor about your ‘Rentenalter’, that is the retirement age in Poland. We believe it should be the same as it was under Prime Minister (Donald) Tusk,” the official in the ad says.
“Please apologise to the Chancellor, but it is the Polish people who will decide about this issue in a referendum,” Poland’s Deputy Prime Minister and PiS leader Jarosław Kaczyński responds.
“Tusk isn’t here anymore, and those habits are finished,” he adds.
German Foreign Ministry refuses to comment
As prime minister, Donald Tusk, the former president of the European Council and now leader of the opposition Civic Platform (PO), raised the pension age to 67 for both sexes – a talking point PiS now often uses in its election campaign.
One of the questions in the referendum, which will be held at the same time as the general election on 15 October, concerns the pension age. Voters will be asked if they are in favour of returning the retirement age to 67.
PiS has long criticised Tusk, suggesting that he is doing Germany’s bidding. At the same time, the party also blames Berlin for trying to influence Polish politics.
The controversial ad also prompted a reaction from Germany’s Foreign Ministry.
Germany and Poland, as partners in the centre of Europe, bear joint responsibility for good neighbourly relations and successful cooperation, the ministry said in response to a question from the Wirtualna Polska news outlet.
“As the federal government, we do not comment on ongoing internal political debates in Poland, including the mentioned election advert,” the ministry added.
Anti-German themes were present in PiS rhetoric long before this year’s election campaign, with the party insisting that Berlin should pay Poland reparations for crimes committed during Poland’s occupation during World War II.
[Oliver Noyan contributed reporting]
(Aleksandra Krzysztoszek | Euractiv.pl)
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