A commission in Poland’s new parliament, which is majority-led by a coalition led by pro-EU liberal Prime Minister Donald Tusk, will report to the justice system about a possible crime committed by the former conservative government in failing to access European funds that Brussels blocked in Poland in a corruption case the rule of law.

According to Reuters, a member of parliament from the current ruling coalition, Roman Gertyh, said on Friday that the appeal to justice is directed against former Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and other officials in his government, Agerpres reports.

A parliamentary commission that will turn to the judiciary discussed on Friday what it presented as a possible offense related to “official inaction that led to Poland’s irretrievable loss of some advance payments from the National Plan for Recovery and Resilience (PNRR) in the amount of 4.7 billion euros”.

The initiation of such criminal proceedings could lead to an aggravation of the political confrontation between Tusk’s coalition and the Law and Justice (PiS) party of former prime minister and current president Andrzej Duda, whose main stakes are justice and the media.

The European Commission accused the Morawiecki government of violating the rule of law by reforming the judicial system, limiting the rights of the LGBT community, or challenging the priority of decisions of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) over national legislation. . Citing these reasons, the Commission blocked funds belonging to Poland in the European recovery plan after the pandemic, a similar measure was taken against Hungary for the same reasons.

In addition, Brussels also no longer allowed Warsaw to access cohesion funds, although, unlike in the case of Hungary, in the case of Poland the new conditionality mechanism that allows the European Commission to suspend European funds for these EU member states has not been activated which , in her opinion, violate the rule of law.

Under these conditions, Prime Minister Morawiecki no longer appealed to the European Commission to pay the funds related to Poland’s PNRR. But the current government says the PNRR also has funds that will not depend on Brussels’ rule-of-law conditions and that the previous government didn’t ask for either, including an upfront payment of €4.7 billion.

After the conservative Law and Justice party (PiS) lost its majority and government in October elections, the new government led by pro-EU liberal Donald Tusk has vowed to reverse the previous government’s measures criticized by Brussels to unlock funds and restore the rule of law.

Thus, in the action plan submitted to the European Commission on February 20, the new Polish government recognized the primacy of EU law and the jurisprudence of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) over Polish legislation and decisions of Polish courts, promised to review the composition of the “inadequate” Constitutional Court, a court where many judges were appointed under previous Conservative governments, also promised to separate the prosecution from the justice ministry to end “politician influence” on the National Magistrates’ Council and strengthen the independence of the Supreme Court.

The European Commission accepted the plan and unblocked all European funds belonging to Poland, approximately EUR 136.3 billion, of which EUR 76.5 billion represent cohesion funds and EUR 59.8 billion from the European Pandemic Recovery Plan (Recovery and Resilience Mechanism) and support green transition The European Commission also approved the first payment of €6.3 billion from Poland’s National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR).

But Polish President Andrzej Duda, who is close to conservatives, and some magistrates in key institutions, including the Constitutional Court, oppose the judicial measures promised by the Tusk government.

In response, the latter submitted a legislative package to the parliament, which aims to “ease the situation” of the Constitutional Court and “reformat” this court by removing the current judges and electing others in their place. However, such an amendment also needs the votes of parliamentarians from the conservative opposition, which has already said it will not support it.

The Constitutional Court was also at the center of political controversy in 2015 when, anticipating defeat in the elections, the then-government of Donald Tusk appointed judges to the court who would later be replaced by the incoming conservative government.