Polish President Karol Nawrocki on Saturday (31 October) accused Prime Minister Donald Tusk of staging a forced takeover of the country’s Constitutional Tribunal, following the suspension of the court’s president.
Late on Friday, the tribunal said its longest-serving judge, Anna Korwin-Piotrowska, had suspended its president, Bogdan Swieczkowski, and taken charge of the court. Swieczkowski was appointed under the previous Law and Justice (PiS) government and served as a deputy justice minister in that administration.
In a statement read by an aide outside the court early on Saturday (31 October), Nawrocki described the move as “a forcible takeover of a constitutional body”. He had been flying to Senegal for a state visit but turned his plane around mid-flight to return to Warsaw.
Nawrocki went straight to the tribunal, where riot police were deployed as several hundred protesters demanded Swieczkowski’s reinstatement. He was accompanied by the Supreme Court’s first president, Zbigniew Kapinski, and called for urgent political consultations.
Writing on X, Tusk said his government was working to restore the rule of law, which the European Union had accused his PiS predecessors of undermining. He said the process was difficult and at times painful, but required decisive action.
The suspension is the latest escalation in a long-running dispute over Poland’s judiciary. After taking office in 2023, Tusk’s coalition pledged to restore the rule of law and reform the tribunal, but Nawrocki, a PiS ally elected president in 2025, has acted to block those efforts.
Earlier this year, Nawrocki refused to swear in three of the six judges nominated by parliament, while Swieczkowski declined to seat judges elected by the current parliamentary majority.
Last month, parliament appointed Tusk ally Maciej Berek to the tribunal, a move critics said undermined the government’s stated aim of restoring checks and balances.
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