Law and Justice wants justice for negligence over floodsLaw and Justice wants justice for negligence over floods. ‘We will draw consequences against all those who neglected their duties’

Law and Justice (PiS) MPs have announced that they will ‘track down the negligence committed by the government’ over the floods and will draw consequences against those who have failed to fulfil their duties. According to Law and Justice politicians, the authorities are showing ‘arrogance and irresponsibility’ in this case.

At a press conference at the Law and Justice (PiS) headquarters, the head of the party’s club, Mariusz Blaszczak, argued that the flooding that occurred in southern Poland was a disaster comparable to that of 1997, and that the authorities were showing ‘arrogance and irresponsibility’ in this matter.

The authorities that govern Poland today are not up to the job - this has to be said very clearly

— he stressed, adding that - in his opinion - the government does not want the public to be aware of what is happening in the flood-affected areas.

He recalled that, according to Disaster Management Commissioner Janez Lenarczicz, the EC had been alerting member states on the floods since 10 September, using the European flood warning system operating through the Copernicus satellite system.

There are fatalities in this disaster. The authority that governs Poland today is not up to the job. It is not acting to ensure the safety of the population. We, as the substantive opposition, have tabled the #NaRatunek package related, among other things, to a special law that guarantees real financial support for residents in areas that have been flooded. The package also guarantees support for farmers, for entrepreneurs, i.e. a very wide range of regulations necessary to provide real help to flood victims

— said the former head of the Ministry of Defence.

Many thanks to all those who support the flood victims through the offices of our MPs and senators from the Law and Justice Committee. But the state cannot be a mess. The state cannot be made of cardboard. As it was under the same coalition until 2015, such a state has returned

— he pointed out.

‘Tusk in a mess’

If these residents had known that the state was as serious as these European alerts indicated, they would have moved out of the area after all

— assessed another Law and Justice MP Zbigniew Bogucki.

Why didn’t they? Because Tusk claimed that the forecasts were overly alarming, saying that there would be local flooding

• he pointed out.

We are perfectly aware of the fact that these great masses of water could not be stopped by anyone, because it is a great force of nature, and this is not what we blame - there is often false information about it in the media. And that is the first objection that we make. We are making an accusation or accusations because of the fact that the crisis management commanded by Donald Tusk is in total chaos

— he stressed.

Since 10 September, when the first alerts went out from Copernicus, these miscreants have failed to use one of the basic instruments that the European community also provides, namely the ability to build reliable maps and predict what will happen. For nine long days they acted like children in a fog. Is this how crisis management should operate?

• Bogucki asked.

‘We will not let this matter rest’.

The Tusk state, in my opinion, is not only a state made of cardboard, but a state made of cardboard squared, and unfortunately the case of Nysa is, like a lens, proof of this thesis. I want to make it clear to millions of Poles that we were just a hair’s breadth away from the greatest tragedy in the Third Republic of Poland, just a hair’s breadth away from the town of Nysa, a town of 40,000 inhabitants, disappearing from the face of the earth

— noted Janusz Kowalski of the Law and Justice party.

On 13 September, it was declared that the Poles were not in any danger, that the forecasts were overly alarmist. The next day in Nysa, the local government, the district governed by the mayor from the Civic Platform, the city co-governed by the Civic Platform reassured the inhabitants that they were not in danger. Donald Tusk came to the conference in the evening; he was reassuring them that nothing was going to harm them. They did nothing. Tusk was only calming them down

— recalled the MP.

We will not let this matter rest. Just as we are tracking down the pathology of power from the Coalition of 13 December, we will track down all the negligence, the omissions that have been made by this government. In exchange for real help, we have got drama. This is not how the state is governed. They are not competent to govern Poland. We will draw consequences for all those who have neglected their duties

— Błaszczak announced.

Tłum. K.J.