Thursday, January 14th of 2016. According to the European Commission, Poland is now amidst a process of military investigation by Brussels due to the denied reform of the Polish Constitutional Government Court, whose main objective is to protect the rule of law.
The Vice-president of the European Commission, Frans Timmermans, commented in a press conference that “apparently the Constitutional Court took decisions that are not being heeded by the country’s other institutions, and there are measures adopted by the legislators which affect their performance”.
He also emphasized the primordial objective of the investigations as “clarifying the facts in an objective manner” and “initiating a dialog with the Polish authorities, without pre-empting the next steps”; furthermore, the Commission will carry out a first and important checkup on Poland, to evaluate and conclude whether or not there is “a systematic threat to the Rule of Law.”
On December 24th of 2015, the reform of the Constitutional Court was adopted, modifying the enquiry’s voting rules for qualified majority; for this reason, the court must work so that 13 of its 15 judges vote in cases of great relevance, whereas previously only 9 were needed. The Polish government had the idea to designate 5 new judges, and in this way, provoke a deadlock with the court’s president; since no other reason for this action has been found.
The second enacted law was chosen on December 30th; which attempts to end the mandate of the board members and the State Channel’s TV and radio stations surveillance council, granting the Minister of Treasury the power to designate the people to cover these positions.
The current published and enacted laws in Poland do not directly bring about an infraction for the European Legislation; but Brussels has raised several questions about the State of Law within said Nation, since Frans had sent a letter in December in which he demanded clear and precise explanations about the two laws from Warsaw.
This is, undoubtedly, a mechanism from Brussels to watch over the Rule of Law in Poland so that no “systemic degradation” occurs; otherwise, the European treaties provide a sanction which consists of immediate removal of the country’s voting rights in the summits and European Union meetings to come. In light of this, the Polish Minister of Justice, Zbigniew Ziobro; considered it “an attempt to press a democratically elected parliament and the Government of a Sovereign State”, this was sent as a message to Timmermans, in a hardly diplomatic tone.
ALFA