“I only wanted to assure the prime minister that I will continue serving as a civic commissioner for human rights,” Adam Borowski said on Telewizja Republika. Today, the Sejm rejected his candidacy for the post of Commissioner for Human Rights and entrusted the position to the controversial lawyer Sylwia Gregorczyk-Abram. “I would have been surprised if the result had been different,” Borowski said, commenting on the vote.
On Friday, the Sejm elected a new Commissioner for Human Rights. The candidates were lawyer Sylwia Gregorczyk-Abram, nominated by the Civic Coalition and the Left parliamentary clubs, and Adam Borowski, an opposition activist during the communist era and head of the Warsaw branch of the “Gazeta Polska” Club.
Sylwia Gregorczyk-Abram received 233 votes, while Adam Borowski received 177. The required majority was 213 votes.
Gregorczyk-Abram’s nomination for the position had prompted opposition from right-wing circles from the outset. This was due to her legal activity during the Law and Justice government, including her involvement in the Free Courts initiative. In December 2023, the Niezależna.pl portal revealed correspondence from the well-known “Wejście” group, which was involved in the takeover of public media and of which the lawyer was a member.
“I would have been surprised if the result had been different”
Borowski commented on the Sejm’s choice on Telewizja Republika. He said that he “would have been surprised if the result had been different,” given the parliamentary arithmetic.
“One side violates civil rights and appoints as commissioner a person who participates in violating civil rights and in violating the Constitution,” he said.
“There is an important issue: Ms Gregorczyk-Abram does not recognise the Constitutional Tribunal or the Chamber of Extraordinary Review. Before these institutions, the Commissioner for Human Rights has a very important instrument—an extraordinary appeal—through which the commissioner may request that unjust or scandalous judgments, issued in breach of all standards, be overturned. […] These submitted cases—and I stress that there are several thousand of them—were considered in only 54 instances this year, if I remember correctly. […] The injured parties will not regain—or rather, will not receive—the opportunity to have their cases properly resolved. This is truly extraordinary, and Ms Gregorczyk-Abram wants to abandon this?” he said.
“This is simply a threat”
He also referred to a statement by Prime Minister Donald Tusk, who had been asked about an attempted forcible entry into the Constitutional Tribunal.
“I generally agree—the sight of the Constitutional Tribunal today is very sad. And as you know, and I want to make this clear immediately, this is only the beginning of our actions. We will enforce the provisions of the law; we will enforce the law in a way that leaves no room for doubt. The Constitutional Tribunal must be supplemented with judges elected by the Sejm, whether anyone likes it or not. We will therefore enforce this by all available means,” Tusk said.
“This is simply a threat directed at the president of the Constitutional Tribunal, a branch of authority independent of the executive. Had something like this happened under the United Right government—had the police entered a court or the Tribunal together with a prosecutor… I only wanted to assure the prime minister that I will continue serving as a civic commissioner for human rights and will defend the independence of the Constitutional Tribunal,” Borowski said.