Tag: National Council for Judiciary

The Senate has voted on the amendment to the KRS Act. Several dozen amendments have been introduced to the draft, including a very important one – granting newly appointed judges the right to stand for election to the Council. This is the result of the Venice Commission’s opinion. But discussions with President Duda also concerned this issue.

The new government is clearly signaling to both the Polish and global public opinion, as well as to EU institutions and the Council of Europe, that it will abide by the rulings of the CJEU and the ECHR.

The new, politically elected National Council of the Judiciary will meet at an extraordinary session next Monday, 28 August. It was called by Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro to oppose what he claims to be the ‘politicisation of the judiciary.’ The NCJ is also expected to support Ziobro in further ‘reforming’ the courts. ‘This meeting will be a tribute of the NCJ’s surrender to Ziobro,’ Iustitia’s press officer tells Onet.

The neo-National Council is not slowing down in staffing the Supreme Court with defective neo-judges. It may now appoint Sakiewicz, a lawyer of the media, or an adviser to a PiS voivod, to the most important court in Poland. There are also plans of a landing of neo-judges in the legal Civil Chamber

PiS is making concessions to the EC. It will pass the disciplining of judges over to the Supreme Administrative Court and restrict the Muzzle Act. But this is another ostentatious change, because it leaves the illegal National Council for Judiciary and the neo-judges who are the source of the problems with the rule of law. The administrative judges are protesting against the changes.

Piotr Schab, president of the Court of Appeal in Warsaw, confirmed that the transfer of two judges to different divisions is a penalty for applying judgments of the ECtHR and the CJEU. Schab and his deputy, Radzik, will face criminal liability in the future for the repressions.

The Sejm has elected 15 members of the new Nationa Council for Judiciary for a second term with the ruling coalition’s votes. They are mainly the members of the Council to date, but there are also a few new ones. The MPs were not discouraged by the fact that several judges belonged to a group on WhatsApp called Kasta/Antykasta.

The Law and Justice party (PiS) is continuing to breach the rule of law and exacerbate the conflict with the EU. The ruling party has already agreed on a list of 15 candidates for the neo-NCJ II, which gives nominations to judges. It will be even worse than the current one, because the list contains “hawks” headed by Łukasz Piebiak. 

The European Commission is to decide whether to unfreeze billions for Poland from the EU’s Reconstruction Fund. It should not ‘buy’ President Duda’s or the Law and Justice party’s (PiS’s) offer. It needs to demand the full restoration of the rule of law. Otherwise, it will condemn the courts to ultimate destruction, reward ‘sly judges’ and antagonise the judicial community.

Our proposal justly differentiates the situations of judges who knowingly chose promotion, while other boycotted defective recruitments – argue lawyers from the Free Courts initiative Michał Wawrykiewicz, Paulina Kieszkowska-Knapik, Sylwia Gregorczyk-Abram, Maria Ejchart-Dubois