Eight Polish Constitutional Tribunal judges demand apology from PiS club head Błaszczak — RMF24

In Poland, eight judges of the Constitutional Tribunal have demanded an apology from Mariusz Błaszczak, head of the parliamentary club of the Law and Justice party. The reason was his statement about the procedure for electing judges, in which he mentioned Adolf Hitler’s election. RMF24 reports.

Demand for an apology

The authorized representative of Magdalena Bieńkowska, Maciej Berek, Marcin Dziurda, Anna Korwin-Piotrowska, Krystian Markiewicz, Sławomir Patyra, Dariusz Szostek and Maciej Taborowski sent Błaszczak a demand for an apology.

The judges called the comparison of their election by the Sejm with the election of one of the greatest criminals in history unacceptable. In their statement, they said that such remarks worsen the standards of public debate and may lead to an escalation of verbal violence.

They demand that Błaszczak apologize to all eight of them for the wording and insinuations that, in their view, compared them and the procedure of their election with Hitler’s election by the Reichstag. The politician must also acknowledge that such statements have no place in Polish public debate.

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What Błaszczak said

Błaszczak made the statement during a conversation with journalists at the Sejm. Responding to a reporter’s remark that the Sejm had elected a candidate for the Constitutional Tribunal by a majority vote, he described this approach as typical of totalitarian states and said that Hitler had also been elected by Germans.

Later, Błaszczak said that Poland’s president safeguards the Constitution and that, thanks to this, the country retains some of the principles of the rule of law. In his view, Donald Tusk and the governing coalition are destroying the rule of law.

Dispute over the oath

Six signatories to the statement were elected by the Sejm in March. Two of them took the oath at the Presidential Palace on April 1, while another four did so on April 9 in the Column Hall of the Sejm, stating that they were taking it before the president. Constitutional Tribunal President Bogdan Święczkowski did not allow these four people to hear cases because he did not recognize the procedure in the Sejm as taking an oath before the president.

Sławomir Patyra, whom the Sejm elected in June, took the oath at the Presidential Palace at the end of July and said he would not hear cases until the other four judges were admitted. Maciej Berek, elected in September, also took the oath in the Sejm. After this, President Karol Nawrocki said that Berek is not a Constitutional Tribunal judge if he has not taken the oath before the head of state.