- The new Polish government has announced that it will formally dissolve all public media with the aim of restructuring them.
- Poland’s culture minister said Polish radio, television and the state news agency would be liquidated in order to maintain operations.
- The new center-left government accuses the public media of having spread party propaganda from the then PiS government in recent years.
The new Polish government of Donald Tusk wants to formally dissolve the public media, but maintain jobs. “Following the decision of Poland’s president to suspend the financing of public media, I have decided to put the companies TVP, Polish Radio and the PAP news agency into liquidation,” wrote Culture Minister Bartlomiej Sienkiewicz on the X platform.
Legend:
Donald Tusk wants to withdraw the public media from the elected PiS government without further ado. Duda (PiS) responded by blocking a new law.
REUTERS / Aleksandra Szmigiel
In this way, the continued functioning of these media can be secured and their restructuring can be continued. With this step, the dispute between the new and the old government camp over public media is entering the next round.
Tug-of-war to restructure public media
Last week, Sienkiewicz fired the entire leadership of the public broadcaster in one fell swoop. The Tusk government accuses the media of having spread party propaganda in recent years under the national-conservative PiS government, which has now been voted out. International organizations had also criticized the one-sided reporting by the public media in Poland.
But the old government is blocking the restructuring of the public broadcasters: On Saturday, Poland’s President Andrzej Duda, who himself comes from the ranks of the PiS, vetoed a law by the Tusk government that would subsidize the public broadcasters with the equivalent of 690 million euros.
Duda justified his move by saying that this was a circumvention of the constitution and a breach of constitutional principles. He demanded that the public media must first be repaired thoroughly and in accordance with the law. The veto made it necessary to formally disband the media, said Culture Minister Sienkiewicz.