The leader of the opposition Conservatives (PiS) Jarosław Kaczyński says his party would report alleged involvement of the Polish security services in the ongoing presidential campaign to the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) and public prosecutors.
His move came in the wake of the revelation that a document with financial data relating to PiS candidate Karol Nawrocki, that could only have been in the possession of those services, was published by an internet portal.
Kaczyński’s remarks followed the confirmation that a financial document revealed by MEP Krzysztof Brejza of Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s centre-left Civic Coalition (KO) was held by Poland’s Internal Security Agency (ABW).
The ABW kept files on Nawrocki because he needed security clearance to carry out his job as head of Poland’s National Institute of Remembrance (IPN). The document that was publicised by Brejza was a customer’s copy of a bank transfer involving a property transaction.
Customer copies are not kept by banks and Nawrocki did not publish it or consent to its publication, therefore it was alleged the document could only have come from his security file.
The published bank document revealed that the PiS presidential candidate Nawrocki paid more than €3,000 on behalf of a senior citizen to cover the transfer of municipal property at a 90 percent discount to the pensioner, a property Nawrocki later acquired in a separate transaction.
The PiS-aligned Polish President Andrzej Duda’s secret service adviser Stanisław Żaryn on May 8 said the document came from Nawrocki’s file and that its publication was in contravention of data protection legislation and laws covering the confidentiality of security clearance procedures.
“Well, now we have confirmation of a scandal. The document published by Brejza is from the security files of Karol Nawrocki,” Żaryn wrote on X.
Żaryn added that “disclosing these materials constitutes a breach of the law and passing them on for use in a political campaign is a very serious scandal”.
Also on May 8, PiS leader Kaczyński held a press conference at which he accused the present government of breaching data protection regulations to pursue a campaign of character assassination against Nawrocki. He signalled that his party would be reporting the matter to the public prosecutors and the OSCE, the body which monitors all elections in Europe.
“We think this is a serious matter … We cannot tolerate a situation in which these sorts of illegal actions are having a direct impact on the election”, said Kaczyński.
The head of the PiS parliamentary caucus Mariusz Błaszczak told reporters that his MPs would press for an emergency sitting of the secret services parliamentary committee to demand a full report from the authorities on the activities of the security services during the election period.
Interior minister Tomasz Siemoniak denied there had been any government involvement in the case.
“The days when the security services were used in a political manner ended in 2023 when PiS lost power,” he claimed.
On May 5, pro-government liberal-leaning and German-owned portal Onet published a report revealing that Nawrocki owned two apartments rather than just the one he had mentioned during a presidential debate a week earlier.
The article suggested that he obtained a 28-square-metre studio flat under questionable circumstances from a pensioner he claimed he was helping.
Nawrocki has since elaborated on his relationship with that previous owner of the apartment. His campaign team presented copies of the property deeds that confirmed the purchase at an agreed rate that was close to market value.
Media reports then surfaced that although Nawrocki had entered into an arrangement where he had pledged to look after the pensioner, he had failed to do so, resulting in the man being taken into care in 2024.
The existence of that arrangement was confirmed by another document published on May 9 by portal Interia, which it was claimed may have originated from the security services.
The last paragraph of that document, signed by both Nawrocki and the senior citizen when Nawrocki was taking up his post as head of the IPN and seeking security clearance, was prepared for the purposes of “submission to the relevant public authorities”.
Faced with negative publicity about the case, Nawrocki decided on May 7 to hand over the property to charity.
