Tusk’s proposal – completely to be rejected

Marian Miszalski

In the framework of ‘go forward’ avoiding the problems, which the government cannot solve, Prime Minister Donald Tusk trumpeted loudly an urgent ‘need to change the constitution.’ One can say that the need to change this bad constitution (passed by the Alliance of the Democratic Left and Polish Peasants’ Party supported by the Liberty Union in 1997) appeared just after it had been passed… We wrote a lot about that in ‘Niedziela’ but we cannot recollect whether this issue has been discussed by the politicians of the ruling Civic Platform. Does this sudden interest to change the constitution result from the need to adjust the Polish Law to the Treaty of Lisbon (which was introduced on 1 December 2009), i.e. to the German politics in Central-Eastern Europe? This politics as usual aims to weaken the Polish state and the guidelines of changes concerning the Polish constitution, recommended by Tusk, serve this politics. Tusk wants to strengthen the present petty party politics constitutionally, which weakens the state. Then Poland would have a system of chancellor government, which would mean a legal culmination of the present petty party politics of treating the Polish state. The centre of gravity of political power would be transferred exclusively to the Parliament, and consequently, the whole power would become a subject of party interests. Tusk’s proposal contains a dangerous element: to eliminate from the political life the nation’s president, who so far has been elected directly in general elections, and thus being the only democratic counterbalance for petty party politics, treating the state as a prey yard of party interests. According to Tusk’s proposal the president would be elected by the particised Parliament… It is worth stressing that the regulations of the present electoral law make the present political parties farms of narrow party staff, and that’s why only… several people in the whole country define the electoral list of candidates (i.e. people we can vote for!). In fact, this is a disguised system of oligarchy, additionally strengthened by financing parties from the state budget and not from the party membership fees. This electoral law and this kind of financing block any political initiatives of citizens, preserve the status quo of petty party politics defined by the round table regulations. They close authentic political life and citizens’ society in the cage of ‘agreement’ of the round table: the collusion of the communist left wing and the ‘secular’ left wing led by General Kiszczak, who has presented himself as ‘a true author of transformations’ in Poland on the pages of ‘Dziennik’ owned by Axel Springer. The references to the German system of chancellor government have no sense. After the war the Germans made the process of denazification whereas in Poland there has been no decommunisation. It is not possible to build any post-Nazi structure in the German political establishment whereas in the Polish political establishment the post-communist structure (lack of vetting, hopelessness and impotence of the state concerning affairs and crimes) is still present, strong and influential. Preserving the present system of petty party politics and parliamentary-cabinet politics (corroded by the influences of post-communists and communism-oriented special services) in the form of ‘chancellor government’ would be an even bigger caricature of democracy, masquerade, hiding party privacy, struggles between party coteries to have access to public money and public properties. This constitutionally ‘established’ weak Polish state would be a dreamed-off subject of the German-Russian game within the strategic German-Russian partnership. Poland, which struggles with increasing efforts to preserve the barely fragile shells of independence, rather needs a presidential system of government, i.e. system allowing us to elect president in general elections, president who will enjoy strong social confidence, who will form government and will have concentration of executive power. This system would resemble the French one rather than the German one but what is more important (after all we need not follow foreign models uncritically) it would refer to the Polish reality and consider the Polish democratic tradition: strong, supra-party presidential system. The August amendment to the March Constitution during the period of the Second Polish Republic (granting the president the right to issue legislative decrees) and the April Constitution. Therefore, it is better to consider the Polish reality and follow the Polish constitutional tradition than choosing odd ideas of ambitious politicians, allowing the state to fall a prey of narrow interests of petty party politics, which makes foreign intervention into Polish affairs possible, not mentioning shaking a betrayer’s purse… In the increasingly difficult international situation, in which Poland is falling, a president elected in general elections, having full executive power, would be a stronger guaranty that citizens could influence the state life. One can clearly see that political parties are not such guarantors at all.

"Niedziela" 51/2009

Editor: Tygodnik Katolicki "Niedziela", ul. 3 Maja 12, 42-200 Czestochowa, Polska
Editor-in-chief: Fr Jaroslaw Grabowski • E-mail: redakcja@niedziela.pl