Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski said on Monday that President Karol Nawrocki personally pressed ambassadors to resign from their posts. That is not the president’s role, the head of Polish diplomacy stressed.
Sikorski said on Saturday on TVN24 that the outgoing ambassadors to China and Romania, Jakub Kumoch and Paweł Soloch, who submitted their resignations, had been “pressured by the president’s staff” to do so.
He added that pressure is also being put on candidates for upcoming ambassador posts. Kumoch and Soloch had said earlier that their decision was a reaction to the situation surrounding the Constitutional Tribunal (TK). Both were appointed by then-President Andrzej Duda.
Speaking to reporters in the Sejm, Poland’s lower house of parliament, on Monday, the foreign minister stressed that judges of the Constitutional Tribunal are elected by the Sejm, not by the president, who, as he put it, “has his ceremonial roles, but that does not give him grounds to rule Poland.”
“The president can, on his own whim, award someone an order, grant someone Polish citizenship, pardon someone, but he cannot choose judges, and he cannot choose ambassadors,” Sikorski said.
He also stressed that he had to correct his earlier statement about the ambassadors.
“On the matter of the ambassadors, I must correct my earlier statement, because I thought it was the president’s staff who pressured the ambassadors to resign from their posts, to abandon their mission. It turned out the president did it personally. It is not the president’s role to force Polish ambassadors to resign,” the foreign minister declared.
Asked where he got his information on the matter, Sikorski replied: “We have this knowledge in the Foreign Ministry.”
“The president’s role is not to rule Poland, just as the role of Constitutional Tribunal judges is not to take PLN 40,000 for doing nothing,” Sikorski said.
He said the opposition must get used to the fact that, as terms naturally turned over, a new majority has emerged in the Tribunal and it has the right to make decisions.
Sikorski was also asked about the idea of a constitutional reset.
The foreign minister replied that the president should carry out his duties, and appointing judges chosen by the Sejm is one of them. “No reset is needed,” he said.
Asked about the list of those absent from Saturday’s consultations at the president’s office, meaning politicians from the Civic Coalition (KO) and the Left, Sikorski replied that for him the most shocking list is that of those who attended.
“I have an allergy to the smell of Russian foot wraps. I mean, (Grzegorz) Braun is a man facing charges for antisemitism, for denying the Holocaust, for assaults right here in the Sejm. You were there, you saw it, right? And now he is a partner for talks with the president, to be received in the Presidential Palace? I am very surprised that the president has gone so far,” Sikorski said.
On Saturday, President Karol Nawrocki held talks at the Presidential Palace with representatives of some parliamentary clubs and caucuses. Among those attending were Grzegorz Braun and Włodzimierz Skalik of the Confederation of the Polish Crown caucus, as well as lawmakers from Law and Justice (PiS), the Polish People’s Party (PSL), Rozwój Plus, Razem and Confederation.
Sikorski said that by refusing to accept the oaths of office of judges, the president wants to turn Poland into a presidential republic without amending the constitution, and to do so through coercion, including physical coercion. “This cannot be accepted. We will defend the constitution, under which the president has a representative role and is not the head of the executive branch,” the foreign minister declared.
“The president has powers defined in the constitution. Entering public buildings by force is not one of them. And I warn the gentlemen from the Chancellery (of the President) that if they try to enter the Foreign Ministry by force, we will prevent it. The president in Poland is not the Sun King. He has prerogatives defined in the constitution,” he stressed.
Asked about the president’s interrupted flight to Senegal, Sikorski said the president did not complete his foreign visit so that he could enter the Tribunal building at night and then leave it. “I would like to know what purpose that served,” the foreign minister said.
In the night from Friday to Saturday, President Nawrocki cut short his flight to Senegal and arrived at the Tribunal’s headquarters. Media published recordings showing him entering the building and a dispute between the president’s representatives and people chosen as Tribunal judges by the current Sejm. The sides give differing accounts of how the incident unfolded.
The crisis at the Tribunal followed Friday’s announcement of a break in the duties of Tribunal President Bogdan Święczkowski and Vice President Bartłomiej Sochański. Judge Anna Korwin-Piotrowska, chosen by the current Sejm, was recognized as the person leading the Tribunal’s work. Tensions and demonstrations then broke out in front of the Tribunal’s headquarters, and police arrived at the scene. (PAP)
