The session of the Sejm of December 16, 2016, during which the budget law was passed, was properly conducted, and the transfer of the session from the plenary hall to the Columned Hall was lawful, the prosecution assessed and discontinued the investigation.
As the spokeswoman of the National Prosecutor's Office, prosecutor Ewa Bialik, told the Polish Press Agency (PAP) on Monday, the prosecutors' findings indicate that the moving of the session "was necessary to ensure efficient work of the Sejm, and the representatives of all parliamentary groupings and non-associated persons had full freedom of participation in the session.
"The Warsaw district prosecutor's office decided to discontinue the investigation, due to the lack of features of criminal acts and non-fulfillment of acts indicated in the notifications," - she added.
The proceedings had been conducted since December 19 last year. It concerned exceeding the authority and failing to perform official duties, as well as acting to the detriment of the public interest by public officials. The notification in this case was submitted by, among others, PO and Nowoczesna.
This refers to the Sejm session of Friday, December 16, 2016. In connection with plans to restrict the work of journalists in the Sejm and the exclusion of one of the PO MPs Michał Szczerba from the session, the opposition then began blocking the Sejm rostrum. Sejm Speaker Marek Kuchciński resumed the session in the Columned Hall, where voting on, among others, the 2017 budget bill was held. The opposition later argued that these votes were illegal due to, among other things, the lack of a quorum.
The Prosecutor's Office assessed, however, that all the votes held in the Columned Hall, including on the budget bill, were "attended by a sufficient number of deputies - from 236 to 237 - to make a decision, so the so-called quorum was ensured.
"This is evidenced by the voting protocols, the reliability of which was confirmed by the testimony of witnesses confronted with the surveillance recordings, as well as by written statements of the MPs taking part in the votes. It was not found that any votes were cast by unauthorized persons" - added Bialik.
According to the Polish Press Agency, the justification for the decision to discontinue the proceedings also stems from the prosecutors' opinion that the exclusion of the PO deputy from the session was legitimate, and the Speaker of the Sejm "acted in accordance with the regulations in this case. It was noted that during the session "numerous MPs, under the pretext of submitting formal motions and asking questions, made statements unrelated to the topic discussed, which provoked shouts from the floor and disrupted the work of the Sejm.
"During MP Michał Szczerba's speech, the Speaker twice pointed out that his behavior was disrupting the Sejm proceedings and stated that the MP was preventing them from being conducted. Despite this, the parliamentarian continued his statements, which did not accord with the solemnity of the Sejm, breaking the rules of the Sejm". - it was noted.
Referring to the transfer of the session itself, the prosecution stated that the Speaker was not able to conduct the session in the plenary chamber due to the blocking of the Sejm rostrum and the Speaker's seat by approximately 100 PO, Nowoczesna and PSL deputies. It was pointed out that this "violated the provisions of the Act on the Exercise of the Member's and Senator's Mandate and the Sejm's Rules of Procedure."
"The Speaker could have called on the Speaker's Guard to forcibly remove the MPs blocking the rostrum and the Speaker's chair, which would have led to an escalation of the protest, undermining the solemnity of the Sejm, or he could have moved the proceedings, which he did," the justification said.
According to the prosecutors, the Speaker was therefore "not only entitled but also obliged to move the proceedings from the plenary hall to another place."
"By allowing the paralysis of the Sejm by some of the deputies disrupting the session, he would be exposing himself to the charge of failing to fulfill the duties imposed on him by the Constitution of the Republic of Poland and the rules of the Sejm," - it was emphasized. It was also noted that the Columned Hall had already been used for this purpose in August 2010 due to the renovation of the plenary chamber.
"All MPs had full freedom to participate in the session of the Sejm moved to the Columned Hall. They were also duly informed that the session resumed after the break would be held there. They received the information about resuming the session at 9.30 p.m. in the Columned Hall via text messages, and the announcement was also displayed on the electronic board in the plenary hall," it added.
The prosecutors referred to the presence of, among others, PO deputies Joanna Mucha, Sławomir Nitras, Agnieszka Pomaska, Elżbieta Radziszewska, Cezary Tomczyk and, among others, Jerzy Meysztowicz from Nowoczesna and Piotr Liroy-Marc (then Kukiz'15).
It was emphasized that representatives of other clubs were not allowed into the Columned Hall only "before the resumption of the session" because "a meeting of the Law and Justice parliamentary club was held there."
The prosecutor's office also failed to establish, as PAP found, "that the list of attendees at the Sejm session included people who did not participate in it."
PAP
Photo: PAP, Gzell
