Today (3rd of April) ist 1234rd day since PiS came to power in Poland. And this is a hundredth piece in our series “Meanwhile in Cuckooland”. During this time we had a chance to learn a few things about Kaczyński’s political organization.
Click HERE to read previous part of the series
Click HERE to see all chapters of the series so far
Some things were to be expected: like the fact, that despite all assurances, money giveaways actually DO cost the state money – prime minister Morawiecki has just announced, that the national debt will need to be increased. Apparently it was not enough to just “refrain from stealing”, as Beata Szydło said few years back. And it’s not that they are not stealing – they just do it in very sophisticated form. The good example can be a “sub-comission for investigation of Smoleńsk plane crash” led by Antoni Macierewicz. In the beginning this institution tried to undermine result of the previous investigation in order to fuel conspiracy theories, but as this has lost all of its political appeal, the sub-commission de facto ceased to exist. De facto, as officially they are still working, taking their salaries, driving the assigned limos and so on. Except, that nobody – nor journalists or the ministry of defense – is able to reach them and ask how they are doing. Phones are silent, spokesperson does not answer e-mails, there is nobody in the office… Even an opposition MP failed to get any information – after 600 days of waiting he received evasive answer.
We have also learned a few things about Jarosław Kaczyński himself. He was always considered to be a slouch, completely unable to comprehend even basic everyday things (for the long time it was pointed out that he has no driving license and uses his mom’s bank account). Meanwhile from the recently published recordings a completely different picture emerges: he turns out to be a man well versed in business and financial matters. He just does not bother with taking responsibility himself, and he conducts all his business using other people as puppets and chain of interconnected companies and foundations that make it nearly impossible to legally tie him to any of his undertakings.
As the public eye was drawn to Kaczyński’s shady businesses, his closest associates also came under the spotlight. And it has emerged that he is not so anti-communist as he claims to be: many of his closest associates have communist past. Even his most trusted [female] secretary, legendary “pani Basia”, has been in the past working for leading communist officials, amongst others in the office of General Jaruzelski. Many other former communists – from PiS MP Stanisław Piotrowicz, formerly communist prosecutor who fought opposition during Martial Law, to Kazimierz Kujda, an important person in Kaczyński’s business empire, who used to be an agent of communist secret police. For the long time Kaczyński was painting the picture of Poland ruled by mafia-like system comprising of the former opposition politicians who together with former communists and agents rule Poland from back seat while making a fortune in their shady businesses. It turns out, that he was kind-of right, except that he was talking from his own experience and it was more like an electoral promise than actual description of the situation back then…
It seems that PiS indeed became an mafia-like octopus, that entangles Poland. The line between the public good and good of the party becomes blurred. Recently a scandal exploded when vehicles of Inspekcja Transportu Drogowego – the inspectorate for road transport – were decorated with the stickers advertising new promises by PiS for the oncoming elections. This is outrageous, as such institution should be completely impartial, otherwise the public trust in it can be undermined. Because can we trust now, that they will do their job, which is, amongst others, fining drivers illegally using emergency vehicle’s blue lights, when the vehicles fitted with those lights are another vans advertising PiS?
Dlaczego te pis-busy (niemieckie!)) mają ukryte „koguty” i lizaki do kierowania ruchem? pic.twitter.com/XRemE0xCFp
— Krzysztof Brejza (@KrzysztofBrejza) 17 marca 2019
It is striking, that PiS politicians seems to feel, that they are too important to travel like everyone else, and even when going to their campaign rallies feel the need to travel on blue lights, like some cacique from ex-soviet republic or Russian Mafioso…
The examples of how PiS changes Poland into their own private grange can be seen everywhere. For them, there is no such thing as independent institutions. Recently a judge has been cautioned under new disciplinary proceedings for that she ruled according to the law. The case concerned a 19 year old mentally disabled men who tried to kiss a 9 years old girl. He was arrested and, despite being illiterate, has not been provided with defence lawyer. The judge refused to upheld his arrest pointing out, that not only is he no danger to anyone, but also his basic rights for defense were violated. Her decision was described in the local press as the case when the judge allowed pedophiles to roam free, so ministry of justice made her an example: newly established disciplinary court (that comprises of un-constitutionally elected judges) has found her to be guilty, meanwhile the prosecutor who demanded arresting the mentally disabled man was promoted. If someone wondered what are the dangers of having a justice system submitted to the ruling party – here is an answer. Imagine you are facing the court, and judges are afraid that they will be disciplined if their rule against the wishes of the party? And, believe or not, you don’t need much to get into trouble: recently a couple of teenagers have been arrested for using part of Smoleńsk monument as a ramp when riding scooters and skateboards. Of course kids all around the world use elements of street furniture to perform skateboard tricks, but not all of the monuments are under 24/7 police surveillance – it’s only those erected by PiS… When it comes to those, there is only one proper way to interact with them: on one’s knees. While hundred years ago it could be a joke worth of Hasek (in “Good Soldier Svejk” feldkurat Martinec got so drunk, that was praying to the monument of Grabowski, builder of Przemyśl), today some people do it for real – here is a picture of an elder man on his knees under the monument of Lech Kaczyński.
No wonder that some people already have to go the round way to get at least some justice. A soldier, after her rape accusations were dismissed in criminal court despite the rapist admitting his guilt (it seems unreal, so no wonder, that whistle blower from Military Police faces being send to psychiatric ward for reporting similar cases), sued the army in the civil court and managed to get compensation for “work-related accident”. Apparently being raped in Polish army is simply an occupational risk. But what do we have to worry, Polish soldiers are known to be afraid of nothing. Bah, forget soldiers, even farmers are invincible. Mateusz Morawiecki recently claimed, that Polish peasants are so good in operating flails, that even Bruce Lee from “Enter the dragon”would be no match to them. And PiS government values brave people, who are not shy of the risk and are open to challenges. Recently a PiS councillor has been made a director of the hospital despite having absolutely no qualifications towards such a job. Asked for his experience in health service he answered “I’ve been sick a lot”. I just hope they won’t appoint bus drivers in that manner, as the person who rides buses most of all people I know is my old neighbour, and he does so because he is completely blind…
Meanwhile teachers are going on strike. Government claims they have no money to meet their demands. That does not mean that they don’t have money of course – they just announced that derelict palace in Warsaw, that has been deliberately left in its derelict state as a symbol of war damage to Warsaw, is going to be rebuild at the cost of hundreds of millions. And what they will place inside? An exhibition showing, how damaged Warsaw was during the war. Pure genius!
Anyway, the teachers are going on strike and the government does everything to turn the public against them. TVP broadcasted the interview with a teacher saying that she is happy with her salary – except that it was just an archival recording taken out of its context. TVP reporters traveled across the country to interview pro-Government teachers, and, incidentally, they made a strange discovery that all schools look the same – see the picture and compare the backgrounds of the interviews of those two teachers from different cities. This is of course not the only example of the manipulation by TVP recently – when TVP Info asked its viewers if they would approve child adoption by homosexual couples, they were forced to delete that poll after 53% of them said “yes”. Because this is not in-line with government stand on LGBT issue. Sadly, the supporters of the anti LGBT agenda are not doing much to help the issue, just as Zofia Klepacka, a sportswomen who raged in the interview with right wing paper about promotion of gender issues in sport. She said that it is so omnipresent, that sportsmen are forced to fill the forms with three options to choose from: Gender, Male and Female. Here you can see what she is talking about. Outrageous, eh?
But I guess with the government supporting right wing extremists, we should get used to the fact, that idiots are more and more visible in the public life. In Wrocław several NGO’s associated with left wing views, as long as music club playing reggae and punk music, have been vandalised with vulgar and racist graphitti. In Gdańsk vegan restaurants were vandalized and decorated with posters saying “We are going to kill you, leftist whores” and “Never enough racism and fascism in our city”. The posters were signed by Szturmowcy – the organization known from annual “independence marches” on 11th of November. On the the Facebook profile of that annual event, just like many other right wing fan pages after the terrorist act in the New Zealand’s Mosque, there was plenty of comments supporting the assassin. Former priest turned fascist preacher Jacek Międlar also expressed his understanding for the terrorist. A right wing “journalist” Marcin Rola (also known to the regular readers of this series) suspects, that it was a false flag operation organized by secret services in order to get pretext to clash on the people who oppose migration. We don’t know what is the foreign minister’s take on this, as he refused to speak about the subject in the radio and left the studio. But I can guess such views are in line with Polish Catholic church, as the biggest Polish sanctuary just hosted annual pilgrimage of nationalists again, calling them “a valuable part of society”. Meanwhile priests in Gdańsk have organized book burning event – books such as Twilight or Harry Potter went up with the smoke. Last time when in Europe young men in uniforms were marching with torches and books were burning it all ended badly…
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Crash ranking latest:
Government limos: 1 (crashed into a tram in Gdańsk)
US Army trucks: 3+1 (three crashed into each other on the road and one hit the bridge after being loaded onto a train without having its container removed)
This piece was written for Britske Listy
Picture: Pixabay.
