Jarosław Kaczyński, the leader of the Polish opposition Conservatives (PiS), has accused the European Commission of planning to intervene in the country’s presidential election due in May.
He was reacting to news that the EC was planning to organise a “round table” to discuss preventing the “abuse and manipulation” of the election’s outcome.
Henna Virkkunen, the EC’s Executive Vice-President for Tech Sovereignty, Security and Democracy, was asked in an interview with broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW) on March 4 if the EC aimed to scrutinise and monitor Poland’s presidential election. That was in the context of alleged abuse of social media platforms by the “far Right” designed to promote its contents and people.
She responded by saying: “We are indeed preparing, together with the national authorities,” adding: “Before elections, we always organise a round table and analyse different scenarios with the national authorities, NGOs and the online platforms themselves.”
That, she said, was to ensure that they “cannot be abused or manipulated and have systems in place that prevent the spread of disinformation”.
Virkkunen recalled a round table was held together with the German authorities ahead of that country’s general election on February 23. She confirmed that a similar event “will happen in the coming weeks”, ahead of Poland’s presidential election on May 18.
Kaczyński reacted to Virkkunen’s remarks on March 6, telling reporters he feared a repeat of events that took place in Romania where the results of the first round of the election in November 2024 were annulled and the second round of that election cancelled on December 6, with the whole election set to be repeated in May this year.
He claimed there were “clear preparations to simply repeat what happened in Romania, that is, to defend this repulsive so-called liberal-democratic, and in fact anti-democratic, system against change, against the building of democracy”.
Other PiS figures chimed in, with former PiS prime minister Beata Szydło telling broadcaster wPolsce24 that Virkkunnen was “undoubtedly attempting to interfere in our internal affairs”, which he said was “absolutely unacceptable”.
The PiS’ candidate in the upcoming vote, Karol Nawrocki, said Brussels should stay “far from the presidential election in Poland.
“Poles will choose their president of Poland. Our president will not be chosen by Brussels, Berlin or Kyiv,” he insisted.
In February, Poland’s PiS-aligned President Andrzej Duda said developments in Romania had made him concerned that the EU could interfere in May’s election over his successor.
The PiS has also noted that Virkkunen, back in 2020, posted a number of Tweets expressing support for Rafał Trzaskowski, the presidential candidate of Tusk’s Civic Coalition (KO). He had stated a victory for Trzaskowski would “be great news not only for Poland, but for all of Europe”.
Trzaskowski lost narrowly but now has again become the KO’s candidate in this year’s presidential election.
The Polish opposition has long held that the EC sought to influence Polish politics, including by deliberately withholding billions of euros in funds from Poland to help remove PiS from power.
These post-pandemic funds were released within weeks of the centre-left government of current Prime Miinister Donald Tusk coming to power in 2023.
The PiS, along with many other right-wing politicians in Europe and the US, have protested about the decision taken by Romania’s Constitutional Court to annul the results of last year’s presidential election.
That came after the first round was won by independent nationalist Călin Georgescu. It has been claimed that the decision was taken under pressure from the EC and then-US president Joe Biden, without clear evidence of alleged Russian interference.
The PiS has complained about the current government withholding the party’s State funding despite a court order for it to be handed over.
It has also has expressed alarm that by refusing to do so, the government was challenging the legitimacy of the Supreme Court – the body that officially certifies Polish election results.
