[ad_1]
As before, Poland and Hungary will be among the top recipients of EU funds and Crown aid. However, they both risk everything with their veto. How does that fit in?
By Jan Pallokat, ARD Studio Warsaw
Poland is the biggest beneficiary of EU funds and, according to current plans, it should remain so. After reunification, more than 120 billion euros flowed into the Vistula. The fact that the country now receives a significant part of the planned reconstruction aid after the pandemic, although the Crown crisis has hit the Polish economy relatively mildly so far, has sparked imagination in specialized ministries. from Warsaw.
According to a compilation of the newspaper “Gazeta Prawna”, the proposals submitted already exceed the almost 60 billion in grants and loans to which, in theory, Poland should be entitled: only the Ministry of State Participations has projects in the areas of energy , transport and environment with a total volume of more than 76 billion euros suggested.
Poland’s long wish list
The wish lists of the other departments are also long: they range from the promotion of agrotourism to investments in irrigation and drainage to the “generation of green energy through photovoltaics.” Even the Justice Ministry, whose department head, Zbigniew Ziobro, is particularly hard-pressed to veto the Brussels plans (“veto or death”), knows what to do with reconstruction aid. It has in mind projects for the continuous training of prisoners or for the digitization of the Prosecutor’s Office.
Paradoxical Poland: The country that has taken a leap in development in recent years thanks to the help of the EU that can compete with the Asian tiger states and that is thirsty to finally catch up with the richer West is about to get a tap to turn off. Especially in structurally weak regions and PiS strongholds, where playgrounds, cobbled streets or bridges with blue EU funding badges have sprung up, the leap in civilization cannot be overlooked.
The veto as a brake on growth
Polish bank economists estimate that eliminating reconstruction aid alone could cost the Polish economy one or two percentage points of growth in the next year. It becomes even clearer when you look in the rear view mirror. A quarter of the impressive economic growth in recent years is due to aid from the EU, analyzes the Ministry of Economy. As a result, 600,000 jobs were created.
But the rule of law mechanism that will be added to payments in the future has rhetorically become such a terrifying monster that a compromise without losing reputation seems hardly possible. There is talk of a “financial muzzle”, of an attempt to “colonize” the country, of a “dictation” of Brussels (President Andrzej Duda) to which Poland submits with the mechanism.
Is the rule of law a “propaganda stick”?
On Wednesday night at the Sejm, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki called the term “rule of law” a “propanda stick” that reminded him of “socialist times”; He made the fight against it a rationale: “We are currently swimming against the mainstream of the EU and a vision of Europe that has no chance of surviving. That is why we decided to fight for Poland and the future of the EU.”
The fact that the financial crisis could actually occur in the end did not seem to be on the bill in the Warsaw government district for a long time. A government spokesman called for calm earlier this week; it was a first exploratory vote on Monday. The actual proof is still pending. And the Deputy Foreign Minister, Szymon Szynkowski vel Sek, assured TVP: “Poland is very interested in quickly activating the multiannual financial framework, because many countries need the money. But that cannot be done at the expense of the sovereignty of the states. of the EU “.
Concern about EU membership
As it did previously in the course of “judicial reforms”, the parliamentary opposition is now warning that Poland is not only threatening to lose money, but also its place in the EU as a whole. “Our membership of the EU is not just a question of finances, but above all a basic feeling of security,” said Boris Budka, leader of the opposition Civic Platform party. “There is no alternative for Poland today.”
The only problem is: even opposition supporters are divided on the issue. A recent poll showed that 57 percent of Poles support the veto in Brussels: PiS supporters anyway, but also many PiS opponents. This does not have to mean that the “reform” of the judiciary enjoys special approval; In polls, this regularly gets poor marks, just as the EU membership lags far behind the central PiS electorate.
The opposition advises the tenacity of Brussels
For many, in times of crisis, one thing is simply more important than the rule of law: that money flows, tries to explain Demoskop Marcin Duma in the daily Gazeta Prawna, co-commissioner of the survey. The government of small town regions is getting a lot of support to take a tough stance. “That can be a problem for the opposition,” Duma said. He lacks popular support for his firm stance against the veto.
All of this could change if it broke down, and the flow of money from Brussels stagnated. This is what Bartosz Wielinski predicts from left-wing liberal Gazeta Wyborcza, advising Brussels to play “hard” at poker with Orban and Kaczynski: “Without EU funding, their systems would collapse like houses of cards.”
The government camp awaits a compromise
In the field of government, however, they continue to rely on a compromise. “Now we await new proposals that are in line with the EU treaties,” said a government spokesman. According to Polish media reports, it is true that in the field of government it is impossible to completely reverse the mechanism of the rule of law supported by the vast majority of EU states. However, the idea of softening it further is rumored, for example due to the fact that sanctions can only be decided unanimously.
The calculation of Warsaw poker players must include the assumption that many states at the table are so desperately dependent on Corona’s help that they prefer to turn a blind eye to the ongoing dispute over the rule of law. Przemyslaw Zurawski vel Grajewski from the state development agency NRR took a look at the letters on a television show. Countries seriously affected by the corona pandemic such as France, Italy, Spain and Portugal depended on a rapid disbursement of reconstruction funds, he explained, and referred to the high debt ratio of these countries: “Our debt is around 60 percent. percent of economic output. We can therefore still borrow money and are in a better position. “
How does Germany react?
Furthermore, people in Warsaw seem to believe that Berlin will also give up in the end and want to keep Poland at all costs: to keep Europe together, but also out of self-interest. After all, Poland has become Germany’s sixth largest trading partner, ahead of Great Britain. If not? “Yes, if the Germans absolutely want to destroy their current economic empire, then we cannot ban them,” recorded Jacek Karnowski, journalistic agitator for the right-wing newspaper “Sieci”. But the Germans should not believe that they can “pacify Poland in such a clumsy way,” he said.
But even if a compromise is reached, it is far from clear that it will be accepted. Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro is likely to make sure that this is the case, who makes it more or less clear in press conferences that there is no rule of law mechanism for him, and that he heads a small PiS partner who is responsible for most of the faction. Before the test vote in Brussels on Monday, Ziobro had declared as a precaution that if the government did not veto him, he would lose his confidence. He added: “That is just a hypothetical scenario.”
