Duda announced this on Saturday on X. He justified his move with the current dispute over the restructuring of public media following the change of power in the EU member state.
“The public media must first be repaired thoroughly and in accordance with the law,” demanded Duda. A veto by the head of state can be overruled with a majority of three-fifths of the deputies present in the Sejm.
However, the government parties together only have 248 of the 460 seats in the Polish lower house. The conflict over the media is the most serious to date between the new government, whose parties won the majority in the October election, and the former PiS state power. Duda is their last high-ranking representative.
On Wednesday, Culture Minister Bartlomiej Sienkiewicz fired the entire leadership of the public broadcaster in one fell swoop. This affected the CEOs and supervisory boards of the TVP television station, Polish radio and the PAP news agency.
The Tusk government accuses the media of spreading party propaganda in recent years under the PiS government. International organizations had also criticized the one-sided reporting by the public media in Poland.
