Support Polish Democracy

We are worried about democracy and censorship in Europe.

We support the Polish PiS Government in creating democracy in Poland.

Democracy is based on debate and freedom of speech together with transparency in public life and equality of citizens before the law. The Polish media including TVP, TVN, Gazeta Wyborcza and mainstream newspapers for the past many years have been very one sided in favor of PO government and against the PiS opposition. The former PO government purged a large number of freethinking independent journalists* from TVP as their first act. In reality there has been until now very little freedom of speech and no true debate of important decisions resulting in massive protests by hundreds of thousands and even millions of citizens. Such protests and demonstrations were often ignored by the media, or if at all noticed then wrongly reported by TVP, TVN and other mainstream media.

*A list of some well-known journalists fired during the PO government between 2007 and 2015: Bronisław Wildstein, Rafał Ziemkiewicz, Jacek Karnowski, Krzysztof Skowroński, Marek Pyza, Anita Gargas, Katarzyna Hejke, Tomasz Sakiewicz, Michał Karnowski, Jacek Sobala, Joanna Lichocka, Anna Sarzyńska, Witold Gadowski, Mariusz Pilis, Agata Ławniczak, Jolanta Hajdasz, Wanda Zwinogrodzka, Artur Dmochowski, Piotr Skwieciński, Maciej Świrski, Krzysztof Karwowski, Marcin Wikło, Bartłomiej Wróblewski.

We support the PiS Government in its effort to include those who PO government excluded and to bring pluralism into the Polish public life and mainstream media in order to eliminate the existing information monopoly.

One of a long list of censorship examples: In November 2015 the Polish President Andrzej Duda (designated by PiS party) was allowed 14 minutes air time in national public media whereas Ryszard Petru from the second smallest opposition party who calls for protests against the government has received 6 hours of air time – that is 25 times more. Another example: In the years 2007-2015 years of PO government, a few thousands actions, campaigns and marches of protests against gross violations of democratic principles took place in Poland. There were protests against tightening the law on freedom of assembly among others. The biggest street protests gathered more than a million citizens. In the largest campaign - each collected more than 2 million signatures. Other examples of extreme desperation of the Polish society under the PO rule include 3 different cases of self-immolation in an act of protest against violations of human rights. One of these acts took place in 2011 in front of the headquarters of PO Prime Minister - currently EU President Donald Tusk. A 49 year old former tax department employee and father of several children left an accusatory farewell letter to Tusk in protest against the way he was treated after disclosing corruption within the system. Such dramatic forms of protest has not occurred in Poland since the communist times. Total silence in the media on all these issues is a powerful testimony of deep corrosion of democracy during the PO rule in Poland.

We support the PiS government in its effort to bring balance into the Tribunal Constitution.

Contrary to what has been heard, Judges of the Constitutional Court, Andrzej Rzepliński - chairman, Stanisław Biernat, and Piotr Tuleja, themselves wrote the new law about Constitutional Court. Therefore, they acted in the position of conflict of interest by writing the law governing their own case which extended their own competences and power, and mixed the legislative and judicial powers. Under public pressure subsequently they had to adjudicate that the law they have written for themselves was “partially” unconstitutional. Chairman Rzepliński does not respect the law enacted by a democratically elected parliament of Poland, in fact appropriating the power for himself. The debate in the Polish media does not reflect the scale of outrage against the abuse of power and disregard for the law by Chairman Rzepliński. Unfortunately the Polish legal community demonstrates professional solidarity with the judges and does not speak up against the flagrant abuse of power by their leaders.  The Constitutional Court should be impartial and should represent both sides of the political spectrum in a balanced way. The former PO government appointed 12 of 15 judges of the Constitutional Court and tried to appoint another 5 judges before their term in office expired in order to secure full control over the Court regardless of the result of the October 2015 elections. This action was unacceptable as no departing government should rule on behalf of the incoming government.

We support the PiS government in its effort to fight against corruption.

The justice system has the lowest public trust among public institutions in Poland as a result of extensive corruption devastating the justice system for years. Rampant corruption in the economy and finance systems, thus lack of free market in practice, the government buying the media for support tax through advertisements and other means are only some of the problems pushed upon Poland during the last eight years of the PO rule.  

The PiS government needs to restore democracy, which was in decline during the PO rule.  

We are worried about free speech and democracy in Europe. We demand an immediate discussion on the ethical reporting in the European media on the European forum.

An uninhibited debate in the media and freedom of speech is the foundation of democracy in Europe. We are concerned about the phenomenon of conspiracy of silence or even deliberately misleading the public by the big European media. Recent events of mass sexual assaults by Islamic immigrants initially were intentionally ignored by the major media. This case shows that despite of assumed pluralism suggested by mainstream media - we have a growing problem of top-down control of information, censorship, intentional silence, and in extreme cases outright lies in the European media. Poland experienced this political correctness censorship in connection with the death of the President of Poland who was killed in 2010 plane crash in Smolensk, Russia, together with a delegation of 96 officials heading to Katyn. A flood of absurd reports and pure misinformation not supported by any evidence and serious source circulated rapidly in the most prestigious European media, while facts based on serious sources and pure science - could not and still cannot get through to the European public, still unable to break the wall of “political correctness” against the truth. Today also, there is no fair reporting of the situation in Poland with the democratically elected government in the major European media. There is no reporting based on facts but mainly emotional attacks and in many cases distorting and misleading propaganda. The scale of the cenzorship phenomenon in Europe as shown by recent events in Germany called by a former German interior minister Hans-Peter Friedrich “cartel of silence” lead to the conclusion that suppression of genuine pluralism and unfettered debate in the European media is alarming, thus the corrosion of democracy becomes a serious problem for Europe, which impacts the increasing number of the European countries. With the sense of co-responsibility for the democratic foundation of the European Union and the well-being of its citizens, we call for of a genuine debate on fundamental issues of free speech and freedom of press that should start immediately:

1. how to restore real freedom of speech in Europe in major media and support a network of independent social media;
2. how to rebuild a fair relationship in the European Union as a voluntary union of nation states based on equal rights;
3. how to restore a free market in the EU;
4. how to get rid of corruption and bureaucracy,how to support and protect the Christian and patriotic values;
5. how to create a mechanism that would assure the emergence of real leaders of the governing Union – leaders concerned with pubic good, who have courage, integrity, vision and ability to defend the EU against false authorities;
6. how to ensure real and genuine security of heritage, identity and culture of the European nations.

We call for an immediate response by the European Commission and the European Parliament to the questions raised in this petition. We call for scheduling dates for debates on these important issue.

We invite all citizens of the European countries who recognize the problems raised in this petition and diagnose the situation in a similar way to join us. Write to citiziens@voicefreeeurope.com

We want and we will take effective action for the protection of the European Union and the ideals on which it was founded.

Please sign this petition in fields at the bottom of this page and send the link to as many concerned citizens as possible.   

The part of this petition concerning corrosion of free speech in Europe and the need for debate on the EU basic issues  - has been included in a separate petition - CLICK HERE. Help distribute the link to this petition among EU citizens.

SEE PROPOSAL FOR WISE REFUGEE POLICY IN EUROPE - CLICK HERE

Glenn Arthur Jørgensen    Contact the author of the petition