As representatives of social organisations, we object to the hostile takeover of the office of Ombudsman by the ruling parliamentary majority. We do not accept the de facto settlement of our rights and freedoms by Julia Przyłębska’s politically dependent tribunal, the disregard of the fundamental principles of reliable proceedings, including the independence and impartiality of judges, in its work.
The view taken yesterday by the tribunal is yet another example of the appropriation of the state by the party in power, the undermining of the foundations of democracy and the circumvention of the provisions of the Constitution in accordance with the principle: “when I am dead the deluge may come for aught I care”.
The provisions of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland do not preclude the continuation of the Ombudsman’s mission until a successor has been elected. On the contrary, the values enshrined in the preamble to the Constitution and its constitutional principles, such as continuity in the functioning of public authorities, civic trust in the state, as well as the concern that the fundamental rights and freedoms of citizens should not be breached, require that this office be held independently by a person who has previously been granted a democratic mandate until a successor is elected.
The opposite standard adopted by Julia Przyłębska’s tribunal means that we are all losing our protector. The people who will be most affected by this change are those for whom the Office of the Ombudsman has been the main refuge and advocate of their rights in recent years. Therefore, the people who will be most affected by this change are those who are at risk of exclusion for various reasons: people from smaller towns, the elderly, people with disabilities, people in crisis of homelessness, people belonging to minorities, especially sexual minorities, and people in detention centres. The Ombudsman’s Office received more than 72,000 requests for protection in individual cases in 2020 alone. In the light of recent events, Poland will also lose an important centre for speaking up for women’s rights.
As a civic society, we are also losing an important centre for social debate, a place where forgotten or ignored problems are raised, and where new ideas and solutions are forged. It is one of the last areas where people with different views could meet and respectfully seek common solutions to the problems they encounter.
The Tribunal’s decision also poses a direct threat to several hundred people working in the Ombudsman’s Office. There is a risk of purges, an attack on their independence and behaviour, which is known from other institutions taken over in a similar way. We stand together in these difficult times with everyone working in the Ombudsman’s Office. We would like to thank them all, as well as the outgoing Ombudsman, for their hard work in upholding human rights in Poland.
We simultaneously demand that the election of a new Ombudsman takes place in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution. We consider any attempt to bypass the Sejm and the Senate when appointing an acting Ombudsman to be a circumvention of the provisions of the Constitution.
We ask the international community to monitor the actions of the ruling parliamentary majority in this regard.
