How Donald Tusk can get around Poland’s president – POLITICO

Mujtaba Rahman is the top of Eurasia Group’s Europe apply. He tweets at @Mij_Europe.

Heading up a pro-European Union liberal authorities intent on reestablishing rule of regulation, former European Council President Donald Tusk’s return to energy in Warsaw has been met with aid and enthusiasm in Brussels and most different EU capitals. 

However that’s the place the excellent news ends.

Whereas Tusk’s authorities will inject optimistic momentum into relations between Warsaw, Brussels and different European capitals, the main political problem that now awaits is whether or not Poland, below Tusk, will be capable to entry its roughly €59 billion tied up within the Restoration and Resilience Facility (RRF) — the EU’s post-pandemic automobile designed to facilitate financial restoration after COVID-19.

Given Brussels’ considerations — largely over rule of regulation, and particularly over judicial independence — below the outgoing conservative Regulation and Justice (PiS) authorities, the ability has but to disburse any cash to Poland in any respect.

In concept, a disbursement ought to now be comparatively simpler below the federal government Tusk is forming. However actuality is all the time tougher.

Problematically for Tusk, President Andrzej Duda stays in workplace. And Duda, who’s aligned with the outgoing PiS authorities, is threatening to veto all laws put ahead by the brand new authorities that’s aimed toward overturning PiS’s judicial reforms. Nevertheless, these reforms are a prerequisite for Warsaw is to unlock its billions from the RRF.

Duda’s stance isn’t shocking. He stays extremely well-liked amongst PiS voters, and serving to the incoming authorities safe entry to billions of euros would most likely alienate a few of his supporters. And will the president want to place himself as a possible successor to PiS chief Jarosław Kaczyński, sustaining this assist will likely be essential.

Furthermore, PiS faces native and European elections subsequent 12 months, forward of which it gained’t be in Duda’s curiosity to grant Tusk such a significant political success. Additionally, passing the judicial reforms Brussels is looking for would cut back the scope of Duda’s powers, limiting his political affect — which he’s seemingly to withstand.

Duda, who will stay in workplace till August 2025, is due to this fact prone to disrupt Tusk’s reform agenda, calling into query the incoming authorities’s means to faucet the cash Poland is owed. As the ability expires in 2026, the president may severely frustrate the nation’s entry to those funds — or its productive use of them — if the cash is delayed for for much longer.

Fortunately, this isn’t the place the story is prone to finish. Relatively, the change in authorities and Duda’s looming veto may very well be seen as authentic causes for the EU to renegotiate Poland’s restoration and resilience plan, which defines the reforms that function the idea for a rustic’s disbursements. And Tusk will virtually definitely search such a renegotiation to avoid the president’s veto.

Certainly, article 21 of the RRF’s regulation permits for the renegotiation of a member nation’s plan in case of “goal circumstances.” And on this case, Poland’s change in authorities and Duda’s unwillingness to approve laws may very well be seen as such.

However a renegotiation may take a number of months, and it might be removed from simple.

First, it may contain altering the order by which reforms should be carried out, thus enabling the federal government to entry some cash primarily based on progress in nonjudicial areas. The judicial reforms may then be addressed as soon as Duda’s time period has ended — though this is able to assume he’ll be succeeded by one among Tusk’s allies, and Brussels by no means likes to get entangled within the “inner affairs” of a member nation.

Furthermore, any renegotiation must be rigorously calibrated to make sure Poland will ultimately meet the EU’s requirements on judicial independence. In any other case, opposition from the European Parliament specifically, in addition to different member international locations which might be additionally below scrutiny for his or her adherence to rule of regulation, would most likely derail Warsaw’s efforts.

Political components will virtually definitely be in play right here. Having ousted PiS there’s large goodwill within the EU to assist Tusk.

Furthermore, he has leverage: European Fee President Ursula von der Leyen is eager to safe a second time period following the European election in June. And this may require the backing of her political household — the European Folks’s Occasion — the place Tusk and his Civic Platform at the moment are arguably an important gamers. For it’s unlikely the European Council will assist von der Leyen except she will line up her personal troops to assist her first.

Involved as it’s a few return to energy by PiS, it’s in Brussels’ curiosity that assist for the Tusk authorities stays excessive and the coalition steady — one thing that RRF funds would assist.

This makes Poland an ideal instance of the place it might be within the EU’s curiosity to suppose politically — and never simply legalistically. Let’s hope it does so.