WARSAW — The right-wing party which formerly controlled Poland’s justice ministry is facing growing heat over allegations it mismanaged a fund meant to compensate crime victims and instead used it as a political slush fund.
The justice minister in the former Law and Justice (PiS) party government that ruled Poland from 2015 until last year was Zbigniew Ziobro, who headed a smaller Catholic-nationalist party called Sovereign Poland that was PiS’s junior coalition partner.
He was one of the driving figures behind the bust-up between Warsaw and Brussels over rule of law — pushing through sweeping changes to the justice system that were seen as bringing judges under tighter political control. He was also the country’s chief prosecutor, and during his time in office prosecutors had a tendency to avidly pursue his political enemies while quietly dropping problematic cases.
Ziobro didn’t have easy access to the media and to political cash, as that was controlled by PiS leader Jarosław Kaczyński. However, the justice ministry did run a special fund that distributed hundreds of millions of złoty a year to help crime victims.
Last week, the fund’s former director, Tomasz Mraz, held a press conference alleging that the fund distributed cash on the basis of rigged contests that were personally overseen by Ziobro.
According to Mraz, “most contests held by the Justice Fund were carried out ‘improperly,’ and the main decision-maker was Ziobro.”
The whistleblower added that “politicians of Sovereign Poland … had been given limits on the funds from the Justice Fund that they could spend on political purposes.”
He also said that over two years he recorded over 50 hours of conversations with officials, although not with Ziobro.
Sovereign Poland issued a press release denouncing Mraz and calling his testimony “a pile of nonsense and manipulation that was used to brutally attack the politicians of Sovereign Poland,” adding: “There were no irregularities in the use of public funds. And the Justice Fund provided Poles with a dozen times more assistance more than under the Tusk government.”
Mraz also testified before a parliamentary team investigating wrongdoing under the former PiS government, which lost power in October to a coalition government headed by Prime Minister Donald Tusk. Mraz is also being investigated by prosecutors over the fund.
According to the prosecution, some 285 million złoty (€66 million) from the Justice Fund may have been misused under Ziobro for political aims.
There are also allegations that the fund was used to buy Pegasus spyware. Parliament is conducting an inquiry into whether Pegasus was used to snoop on opposition politicians during PiS’s time in power.
A very political scandal
The issue is blowing up into a major political scandal just as Tusk rallies support for his Civic Coalition party ahead of the European election.
“If this testimony is credible, then we are effectively dealing with an organized criminal group led by the prosecutor general,” Tusk told state broadcaster TVP Info on Thursday.
“I do not recall any country in Europe where such activities — which deserve to be called an organized criminal activity — were led by a justice minister and prosecutor general,” Tusk also said.
Tusk has recently stepped up rhetoric targeting PiS, painting it a corrupt force that set Poland apart from the EU’s democratic mainstream and made the country vulnerable to Russian influence.
The incumbent Justice Minister and Prosecutor General Adam Bodnar said on Thursday that he will present more details about the alleged corruption at the Justice Fund this week.
Bodnar also said that the investigation into the Justice Fund could result in a “motion to lift immunities” of any politicians involved.
Ziobro disappeared from the public eye early in 2024, having to undergo cancer treatment.
Both PiS and Ziobro’s people are vehemently denying the allegations.
“What is being portrayed as rigging competition [in the Justice Fund] was actually exercising public authority. People entrusted ministers with the task of redistributing funds,” said Patryk Jaki, a member of the European Parliament and Ziobro’s party colleague.
“Of course, one could say that sometimes it was done subjectively. However, [Ziobro] had the right to do so from start to finish,” Jaki added.
Corruption allegations swirl over Polish opposition party
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