The President asked clear questions—Tusk responded with insults.
“It’s a shame the Prime Minister refuses to comment on the President’s letter, because the questions are very straightforward: What exactly is the Prime Minister doing in Brussels to safeguard Polish security—aside from saying he won’t be outplayed?” said Małgorzata Paprocka, Head of the Chancellery of the President of Poland, in an interview with Polskie Radio (currently in liquidation).
Tusk has a short memory
On Wednesday, President Andrzej Duda signed into law an amendment limiting the right to asylum—something government officials, including Prime Minister Donald Tusk, had been urging him to do. That same day, the President also sent a letter to the Prime Minister concerning the protection of Poland’s borders, including the western border. When asked on Thursday whether he intended to respond, the Prime Minister said he had “nothing good to say” about what the President had been doing lately, including the contents of the letter—so he would not comment. “There are 131 days left, and we’ll manage somehow,” he added, referring to the end of President Duda’s term.
Paprocka remarked that this is clearly an attempt by the Prime Minister and his team to erase the impression left by their actions at the start of the migration pressure on Poland’s borders. This includes—she added—referring to aggressive migrants as “poor people” or proposing that they be let into Poland without any control.
Now that public expectations are clear, this letter is a very simple “reality check”—to see whether the government’s declarations were just for show during the campaign, or mere Twitter soundbites, which is the medium the Prime Minister has chosen to use for communicating with the public. And the response? A curt, borderline-hostile remark from the Prime Minister, pointing out how many days the President has left in office. But these aren’t just the President’s questions. These are questions from citizens who want to live in a safe country. They want to know what will happen with migrants—whether we’re accepting those being sent back to us from Germany, whether integration centers are being built, how many are under construction, and what the costs are,” Paprocka said.
“It’s unfortunate that the Prime Minister doesn’t want to address the President’s letter, since these are very simple questions: What exactly is the Prime Minister doing in Brussels to advocate for Poland’s security—apart from assuring us he won’t be outmaneuvered? I’m aware the migration pact is scheduled to be implemented next year. I understand the Prime Minister is hoping to hold out until the presidential election, banking on a victory for Rafał Trzaskowski—after which no one will ask these kinds of questions anymore. No one will stand up for the safety of Polish citizens. Instead, there will be a polished Twitter-media narrative about how wonderful everything is—while behind the scenes, a completely different policy will quietly be carried out,” she emphasized.