Poland names private TV stations “strategic firms”, allowing blocking of sale to “hostile” states
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Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and is published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.
Poland’s government will add the country’s two largest private TV stations, Polsat and TVN, to its list of “strategic companies” under special protection. That would allow the authorities to block the potential sale of the firms to owners from “hostile states”, notes Prime Minister Donald Tusk.
The decision comes after recent speculation that the owner of TVN, US media conglomerate Warner Bros. Discovery International, is planning to sell the broadcaster.
Rumours have suggested that a businessman linked to Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán – who is an ally of Poland’s national-conservative opposition – is seeking to buy TVN.
📍TVN i Polsat zostaną umieszczone w wykazie firm strategicznych, które podlegają ochronie np. przed agresywnym i niebezpiecznym z punktu widzenia interesów państwa polskiego przejęciem.
Rada Ministrów przyjmie “Rozporządzenie Rady Ministrów w sprawie wykazu podmiotów… pic.twitter.com/zEOF8I12E3
— Kancelaria Premiera (@PremierRP) December 11, 2024
Under a Polish government regulation, 17 companies that are deemed strategically important to the state are already under special protection.
Most are Polish state-owned firms, such as energy giants Orlen and Tauron, but the list also includes French-owned telecommunications operator Orange Polska.
On Wednesday afternoon, Tusk announced that TVN and Polsat would next week be added to that list. They are by far Poland’s largest private broadcasters, operating a number of TV channels as well as various websites.
TVN has been owned by Discovery (and later Warner Bros. Discovery) since 2018 while Polsat is part of the business empire of Zygmunt Solorz, one of Poland’s richest people.
“TVN and Polsat will be placed on the list of strategic companies that are subject to protection, for example, against an aggressive and dangerous takeover from the point of view of the Polish state,” said Tusk, quoted by news website Onet.
“We would like to protect our country and the European Union from interference in electoral processes or attempts to take over or interfere in the work of our media,” continued the prime minister. “That is why I have made [this] decision.”
“Without the consent of the Polish government, it will not be possible to take over or buy companies that are on this strategic list,” he explained, quoted by broadcaster RMF.
However, Tusk added that the government would “make decisions on this issue in a transparent manner” and that any such decisions “will also be subject to appeal”.
Premier @donaldtusk 👇
TVN i Polsat zostaną umieszczone w wykazie firm strategicznych, które podlegają ochronie np. przy tak agresywnym i niebezpiecznym, z punktu widzenia interesów państwa polskiego, przejęciem. pic.twitter.com/lwXj9SBMIu
— Kancelaria Premiera (@PremierRP) December 11, 2024
“[Given] rumours or gossip that there are people in the East interested in possibly taking over the media or influencing the work of the media in Poland…this matter is very serious,” added Tusk. “We will not allow hostile states to interfere in a brazen manner…in our daily lives, in our economy or in electoral processes.”
The prime minister did not specify which “people in the East” he was referring to. Recent media reports have identified two main foreign parties potentially interested in buying TVN, both from the south of Poland rather than the east.
One is the Czech PPF Group of Renáta Kellnerová, the widow of billionaire Petr Kellner. The other is Hungary’s József Vida, who is seen as being having close ties to Orbán.
Orbán has long been an ally of the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS), Poland’s former ruling party and now the main opposition. Tusk, by contrast, has regularly criticised Orbán, in particular over his sympathies towards Russia.
A Polish deputy foreign minister has suggested that Hungary could leave the EU and NATO and “form a union with Putin”.
His remarks came after Orbán called Poland hypocritical for criticising Hungary’s relations with Moscow while itself buying Russian oil https://t.co/peBrHdGFVw
— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) July 29, 2024
Earlier this week, Andrzej Stankiewicz, a journalist with Polish news website Onet, claimed to have heard from sources that a deal for TVN to be sold had already been agreed, with details to be announced in the coming days. He reported “great joy among some PiS politicians” at the news.
Under its current ownership, TVN has held a broadly liberal profile and has been strongly critical of PiS. In 2021, PiS passed a law that would have forced Warner Bros. Discovery to sell its majority stake in TVN. However, that was vetoed by President Andrzej Duda.
Tusk’s decision was today welcomed by figures from his ruling camp. “The state should protect free media from owner-driven activities aimed at creating channels of disinformation and expanding the influence of Russia (and their Orbanite brethren)!” tweeted MEP Michał Szczerba.
“Polish media should serve Poles, not the Kremlin,” declared Zbigniew Konwiński, the head of the parliamentary caucus of Tusk’s Civic Coalition (KO). “The media market cannot be infiltrated by capital that stinks of Putin from a mile away,” added another MP, Robert Kropiwnicki.
Blokada sprzedaży Polsatu i TVN rosyjskiemu kapitałowi to bardzo czytelny sygnał dla tych wszystkich, którym marzyła Rosja nad Wisłą. Polskie media mają służyć Polakom a nie Kremlowi.
— Zbigniew Konwiński (@Konwinski_PO) December 11, 2024
However, PiS figures strongly criticised the move. Former justice minister Zbigniew Ziobro accused Tusk of “interfering in the ownership of media companies…to the detriment of private owners, but also the public interest, brutally violating legal transactions and ownership relations”.
Mocking claims by Tusk and his supporters while in opposition that, by opposing PiS’s actions’ towards TVN, they were defending “free media”, PiS MP Robert Gontarz said that it is now clear they were simply “fighting for a media free from criticism of Tusk”.
Sebastian Kaleta, a former deputy justice minister in the PiS government, claimed that it is not even legally permitted to add media companies to the list of strategic firms under special protection. “Tusk is blatantly breaking the law to prevent his propaganda mouthpiece from changing owners.”
Kolejny dowód, że Tusk mówił serio, zapowiadając łamanie prawa jako regułę swoich rządów. Wystarczy wspomnieć bezprawne przejęcie mediów publicznych i Prokuratury Krajowej. Teraz, z pełną premedytacją przekraczając uprawnienia, ingeruje w właścicielski status spółek medialnych.… https://t.co/NXkTNsO2z6
— Zbigniew Ziobro | SP (@ZiobroPL) December 11, 2024
Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.
Main image credit: Slawomir Kaminski / Agencja Wyborcza.pl
Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.
