The future of the Polish tri-party coalition government is being questioned because parliament voted on a controversial media ownership bill on Wednesday that could cause the country’s largest remaining independent television station to lose its license.
After a night of protests against the bill in Warsaw and 80 other towns, opponents saw it as an attempt to silence a frequently criticized broadcaster, and the government expressed confidence on Wednesday to win the vote.
But the result is far from certain, because Prime Minister Mateus Moravitsky fired his deputy, Yaroslaw Govin, the leader of the junior coalition member Yakod on Tuesday, because he criticized the law and prompted the The party officially left the government.
“I am counting on issues related to media law to gain a majority in parliament, and I believe the coalition right-wing government will continue to operate,” government spokesman Piotr Muller told public radio.
In the 460-seat lower house of parliament, the 13 members formally belonging to the Accord group and the main partner of the United Right Alliance, the Populist Law and Justice (PiS) Party, are increasingly divided. Their departure has made the government lose its power. One vote majority.
But this does not automatically mean the collapse of the PiS-led government, which requires a formal vote of no confidence in parliament. Mueller stated that he believes that “enough members of Parliament support the beneficial reforms we propose.”
Observers said that PiS will try to persuade individual Accord MPs to break the partisan line, and will also seek to win enough independent MPs to secure a majority of seats. Polish media reports on cash And provide other incentives.
Gowin stated that his party will “sweep” from the government after expressing deep disagreements over the planned tax reform-the so-called “Poland Agreement”, which aims to win re-election in the government in 2023-and the media bill. .
If passed, the broadcasting law would prohibit any television station from holding a majority stake in a company outside the European Economic Area, forcing the U.S. Discovery Group to sell its majority stake in the main Polish private network TVN.
“This law clearly violates the principle of media freedom,” Gowin said, adding that this change will “prompt us to confront the United States, which is our most important ally from the perspective of national defense.”
Since July, the opposition civic platform led by former Polish Prime Minister and European Council President Donald Tusk is determined to defeat PiS and see media freedom as an issue that can unite a broad opposition coalition.
Tusk’s former Foreign Minister and Citizens’ Platform Member of the European Parliament Radoslaw Sikorski wrote on Twitter on Wednesday: “Our Parliament will vote today to deprive Poland’s largest American independent television station TVN of the right to vote. If With the passage of the bill, we are likely to go into the path of no return to the tyrants of thieves.”
The government denies that the measure targets any broadcaster, saying it aims to prevent potential media acquisitions by non-EU countries such as Russia and China, and rejects proposals to restrict ownership bans to non-OECD countries.
However, this move occurred after the government continued to promote the control of Polish media. Public service organizations such as state-owned TVP television stations became the propaganda agencies of the ruling party, while private and independent media were steadily eliminated.
Washington urged Warsaw to reconsider, saying that the proposed law would inevitably damage the “defense, commercial and trade relations” between Poland and the United States. Hundreds of Polish journalists and editors also signed an open letter calling on the government to stop “damaging the freedom of the media in our country.”
