The EU Commission, Berlin and the Polish government have been debating the issue of judicial reform for some time now. Due to alleged violations of principles of the rule of law, Poland has been threatened by a withdrawal of voting rights in the EU Council.
The Polish government, on the other hand, argues that the changes are needed to make the work in the courts more efficient and to eliminate the legacy of the communist regime. It is about rebuilding the basis for trust in the judiciary, Duda says. “Even today there are judges in Poland who before 1989 participated in injust sentences against people protesting against the communist dictatorship.”
He said he wanted a” generational change”. Duda was literally “grilled” on issues related to judicial reform by the journalist of the state-owned Deutsche Welle.
In his response however, Duda exposed the Western media bias. After a question from the editor of the German daily Tagesspiegel regarding the decision of the European Court of Justice last Friday to suspend the Polish Supreme Court Act and why Polish national radio did not broadcast this information, the Polish president replied that he did not control the media, but when a woman is raped in Poland, the Polish media would report immediately and include all the details available about the incident.
This was a clear allusion to the delayed information of the German media about cases of rape by migrants, as they took place at the New Year’s Eve celebration in Cologne in 2016.
Not surprisingly, the Polish president’s response to this question was not reported in Germany.
Polish President triggers media during a Q&A in Germany with the German President
Press- Why didn't your state radio report about EU's decision to freeze your judicial reform?
President -"I don't know but our media would report if our women were raped. Our press is free"😎😎😎 pic.twitter.com/AVwLWjT54a
— BasedPoland (@BasedPoland) October 24, 2018
Neither the ARD, ZDF or other mainstream media reported the president’s answer. The Polish observer Marcin Kedzierski even wondered why the Germans had organised such a “birthday party” for the Polish President on the occasion of the centenary of Polish independence.
“Every time I come back from Germany, I wonder why I should continue to like Germans. The Spaniards, Greeks and Italians have stopped. Do Germans really want to upset all European nations?” Kedzierski noted.
In the recent regional elections, the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party made gains and remain the largest party with 32.3 percent of the vote.