Poland ruling Law and Justice party dismisses European Commission concerns that the new law threatens media freedom.
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Under the new law, approved on Thursday by President Andrzej Duda, the treasury minister has the right to appoint heads of state-run broadcasters – a prerogative he used on Friday to name Jacek Kurski, a former PiS member of parliament, to head state television.
In an unprecedented move, the European Commission is set to debate the state of rule of law in Poland on January 13, which could lead to potentially punitive measures.
“Free media” protests were held in the cities of Poznan, Wrocław and Krakow, Radio Poland reported.
Earlier, the party had alluded to plans to “depoliticise” the state media, however it says the EC may have been given misleading information. They chanted “Free Poland, Free Media” and “Stop Spoiling Democracy”.
The Polish foreign ministry has criticised German politicians for what it calls “anti-Polish” comments but has given no details of which ones.
A new head of the public broadcasting agency is to be named on Monday.
The government had said the media law was necessary, since state media became too biased during the eight years before the new administration took over. The bill aimed to establish a national media system.
The law drew criticism from within the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. It says it has a broad mandate to redesign the country to reflect its Catholic values and independence from the European Union in Brussels.
European Parliament President Martin Schulz compared the actions of the Polish government with those of Russian President Vladimir Putin in comments to German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung on Sunday.
A week ago, Gunther Oettinger, the German EU commissioner responsible for the digital economy and society, said that Warsaw should be put under the EU’s rule-of-law supervision.
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“PiS is using good old-fashioned propaganda that Poland remembers from the past”.
