A legislative draft to dissolve the anti-corruption agency (CBA) is to be ready by the end of March, according to Tomasz Siemoniak, the minister responsible for Poland’s security services in the new government. The legislation is to divide the functions and assets of the agency among the police, the internal security agency (ABW), and the treasury police.
The minister acknowledged that it will be hard to convince President Andrzej Duda to sign the legislation, therefore the actual dissolution of the agency may have to wait until after the presidential election due in the spring of 2025. Duda has been a consistent advocate of keeping the CBA as the focal point for the fight against corruption.
CBA was founded by the first Law and Justice (PiS) government (2005-2007) in 2006. There was general political consensus at the time that such a body was needed, and the following Tusk government (2007-2014) did not dissolve the agency.
This was so despite the agency having been embroiled in a controversial sting operation against former Deputy Prime Minister and Agriculture Minister Andrzej Lepper that indirectly led to the collapse of the PiS coalition government in 2007. CBA officials were later accused and convicted of abuses of power, despite the fact that some of the officials they were pursuing were also eventually convicted of corruption.
Two of the officials convicted were Mariusz Kamiński and Maciej Wąsik, who were pardoned by President Andrzej Duda in 2015. However, those pardons were invalidated by some courts, leading to the two eventually going to prison and losing their parliamentary mandates under the latest Tusk government, before Duda pardoned them once again in January of this year.
During its spell in opposition (2015-2023), Tusk’s party and his present coalition allies came to the conclusion that the agency’s reputation had been diminished by allegations that it had become dominated by PiS, and despite the agency’s record of identifying corrupt officials, the coalition agreement of the new government included a commitment to disband the CBA.
