Poland’s constitutional crisis deepens after court verdict

Neither the judiciary nor the government are ready to give in.

Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal ruled Thursday that a new law regulating its own functioning is in part unconstitutional — a decision that threatens to escalate its long-running row with the right-wing Polish government.

The Law and Justice party (PiS) government has already refused to recognize the tribunal’s negative verdict delivered in March on an earlier version of a law regulating how the court should organize its work. Last month the PiS-dominated parliament passed a new law — formally approved on July 30 and due to take effect on August 16 — spelling out the functioning of the 15-judge tribunal.

The regulation was challenged by Polish opposition parties, who sent it to the tribunal for scrutiny, which prompted Thursday’s verdict.

The government is looking for ways to end the standoff without ceding key elements of the law.

“Not even a democratically elected parliament has the right to set regulations that conflict with the fundamental law,” Andrzej Wróbel, one of the judges on the Constitutional Tribunal, said in an explanation of the verdict.

The constitutional crisis has already sent thousands of people onto the streets in regular anti-government demonstrations and strained Poland’s relations with allies and the European Commission.

Jarosław Kaczyński, leader of Law and Justice and Poland’s most powerful politician, said on Wednesday that any action by the tribunal against the new law would be illegal and the body was trying to “set off a political battle.” He regards the tribunal as a defender of the “political elite” that is blocking his effort at a sweeping transformation of the Polish political and judicial system.

“There are constant efforts to put the [tribunal] in a superior position to other bodies, including the legislature,” he told reporters.

The crisis began last year when Civic Platform, the party then in power, improperly nominated two judges to the tribunal. When the PiS won October’s elections, it refused to recognize them and also blocked three other judges who had been properly selected by parliament. PiS also wants the court to hear cases in chronological order, rather than setting its own priorities for tackling its caseload.

However, the PiS crusade against the court is causing diplomatic problems. U.S. President Barack Obama raised the issue when he met Polish President Andrzej Duda at the NATO summit in Warsaw, and the European Commission has launched an unprecedented probe into Poland’s rule of law.

In a July assessment of the new legislation, the Commission said it believed there was “a systemic threat to the rule of law in Poland.”

Kaczyński responded by saying the criticism from Brussels “amuses me.”

Warsaw has three months to address the issue or potentially face losing its voting rights as an EU member.