NEW YORK TIMES: Poland’s new right-wing government has moved rapidly in its first months in power to pack more sympathetic judges on to the nation’s highest court and blunt its ability to overturn new laws. It has announced plans to put the choice of the country’s top prosecutor directly in the hands of party leaders. It has granted a presidential pardon to a former security chief who has been appealing a three-year sentence for abuse of office stemming from the governing party’s last time running the country.
And in recent weeks, over howls of protest at home and abroad, it has jammed through one law, and announced others to come, that will give the party a nearly uncontested grip over the country’s broadcasting system, including the top-rated television channel.
The primary force behind these changes is not the new president or the new prime minister. It is Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who holds no elective office but who, as head of the governing Law and Justice Party, is one of the most familiar names in Polish politics and arguably the most powerful… (more)
NEWSLANC EDITOR: Poland is now following the path of Hungary. Mafia like leaders have learned well from the Nazis and Communists how to seize control once they an win an election so they never can lose again.
