There'll be a fresh billing committee! Are you happy? The press conference was attended by ministers Adam Bodnar and Tomasz Siemoniak, announcing the establishment of a committee on the clarification of "mechanisms of repression against civilian society in 2015-2023".
As shortly as the first information about the committee came out, a fewer weeks ago, I wrote to the Ministry of abroad Affairs with questions about it. Unfortunately, the answers I received (twice) were clear and not about. After the ministerial conference, these questions are inactive important.
Firstly, if a committee is formed, there must be a legal basis for its action. Since it is not expected to be an investigative committee, this would should be a bill, which would, of course, have caused a brawl in the Sejm, and rightly so – but a committee "working on documents", so the mechanics of its appointment will be identical to that of the grotesque committee on Russian and Belarusian influences, created on the basis of the Prime Minister's order, to which Mr Bodnar referred straight during the conference. The basis for the appointment of the committee, as the Minister of Justice stated, will be the order of the president of the Council of Ministers, who is not there for now. So it seems that the committee has only just been set up and not formed or arose. Therefore, we do not have a part of government before us, which brings everything that was said at the conference.
Secondly, we can trust only on the statements of ministers in this situation. It follows that the committee is to deal with "repressions" towards "democratic activists" or "representatives of civilian society". The question is raised here: what legal instrument defines in this context the concept of repression and, above all, what is the legal basis for distinguishing “democratic activists” from the others, i.e., by reasoning a contrario from non-democratic, or non-adjective? You don't know that. Anyway, I don't want those another committees to be concerned. There is besides no act that defines the concept of "civil society" utilized by the Minister of Justice throughout the conference.
Mr Bodnar besides stated that the committee is to prevent the abuse of power, specified as the regulation of freedom of assembly or of speech, whatever this would mean, against the "civil society" in the future. The problem is that if, in fact, the scope of the committee's action were to be universal and aimed at the future (also closer to it), it should besides be universal and should include people with different planet views and political views. But that is not the case.
Thirdly, the committee was to sit on "representatives of civilian society". Looking at the names, we see in fact only the declared enemies of the erstwhile power, which is not surprising, since the time frame of interest of the committee has been very clearly outlined. Ms. Sylwia Gregorczyk-Abram, who is to lead the committee, is connected with the initiative of the Free Courts, that is, the political environment which has eaten up the fight against the Law and Justice. another people are leftist activists, Mrs. Clementina Suchanov, 1 of the animators of the Women's Strike; Andrzej Krajewski – journalist, associate of the anti-scriptive writer Society, who for the Law and Justice was active in mirroring primarily the “News” of TVP (also pointed out the propaganda character of the program; unfortunately, he suspended his useful activity with the arrival of “clean water”); finally, there is Dr. Mikołaj Małecki from the Jagiellonian University, 1 of the most clearly defined lawyers on the side of the current power.
The question so arises here, who and on what rule called – or rather: will call – these people. We don't know that either, of course. 1 can only presume that the regulation will be akin to that of the above-mentioned Committee on Revenue, to which its representatives, on the basis of the order of the Prime Minister, could freely appoint the members of the order mentioned in the legal act. That's what I'm saying.
Fourth, the key point of the ministers' announcement is that "the committee will besides address the issue of the introduction of compensation mechanisms for representatives of organisations who have been repressed". What are these "compensation mechanisms" expected to be? Who and how should this "compensation" be calculated and from which funds should it be paid? Of course, nothing is known about this. Journalists didn't ask. And this is the most interesting one. As long as the remainder of the committee's activities, acting solely on the basis of an order – and so a part of government which is not commonly applicable – will be just a kind of curiosity (although it does not exclude that any action of power may usage the committee's reports as a justification), money is active in the case of "compensation mechanism".
Fifthly, it can be concluded from Mr Siemoniak's words that the committee is to deal with the activities of politicians of the erstwhile camp of power, who, for example, restricted the freedom of assembly. But if that freedom was to restrict illegally, then it's for the prosecution and the courts. So where is the function for the committee? I don't know.
Counselor Sylwia Gregorczyk-Abram, speaking about the committee's actions, presented the image of the PiS state as tormenting and persecuting “democratic activists”. However, as a substance of fact, everything she said could besides mention to the present power, but with the reversed sign.
Also interesting was the message of editor Andrzej Krajewski, whose unilateral blindness took on an highly annoying image of the Lysus tromtadration. The Commission, in its opinion, is expected to compensate the actual patriots who protested against the erstwhile power on the streets and within their "patriotism" they even had the right to show disobedience to that power. Of course, the editor of Krajewski – who, in the framework of his laziness, was willing to trust even on the Prime Minister's exposé – does not take into account that anything bad could happen to the "citizen society" for his current power, as he stated in his speech that the committee was to prevent anything akin from happening in the future "if akin authorities had come a". This is therefore, according to his words, virtuous and immaculate.
At the end of the conference there was time for questions. The first and only opposition on behalf of media asked Samuel Pereira of Poland24. However, alternatively of aiming precisely at 1 of the mentioned topics, Mr. Pereira gave a babbling antibodnar political manifesto. Bravo! This symbolically reminds us of why the political camp of the PiS lost power.
Luke Warches
Tusk wants “to reconstruct the regulation of law”. Mentzen mocks his words and writes about “a mockery”
