Polish prosecutors indict ex-deputy energy minister over corruption charges

Polish prosecutors have filed an indictment against a deputy energy minister in the former Law and Justice (PiS) government, accusing him of corruption.

The former deputy minister, who under Polish privacy law can only be referred to as Adam G., is alleged to have accepted more than 170,000 zloty (just over €40,000) from a local businessman in 2019. The proceeds were allegedly used to fund his and his wife’s election campaign, investigators say.

Adam G., who denies the allegations, faces up to eight years in prison.

Były wiceminister energii Adam G. został oskarżony o przyjęcie w 2019 roku korzyści majątkowej w kwocie 171 674 zł.

Akt oskarżenia przeciwko niemu i 5 innym osobom został wczoraj skierowany do Sądu Rejonowego w Wodzisławiu Śląskim. 🔽https://t.co/InCjVr6DGs

— Prokuratura (@PK_GOV_PL) August 22, 2024

The former deputy minister is alleged to have accepted 171,674 zloty from a businessman, Marek K., from the southern Polish city of Katowice through another marketing and advertising entrepreneur, Jerzy U., the national prosecutor’s office said.

“The funds obtained were entirely used to finance the election campaign of the accused Adam G. and his wife (the campaigns for the Sejm and Senate in 2019),” said the national prosecutor’s office in a statement published on Thursday. “This constituted a violation of the provisions of the Electoral Code governing the financing of election campaigning.”

In addition to Adam G., five other people have been indicted for aiding and abetting the transfer of money, and the issuing and use of fictitious VAT invoices.

“When questioned as a suspect, Adam G. did not admit to committing the alleged acts. Both he and the other defendants gave extensive explanations,” said the national prosecutor’s office.

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The former deputy minister first heard charges in early December 2023. At the prosecutor’s request, he was placed in pre-trial detention. The other suspects are under police supervision.

Adam G. was elected in 2015 as a senator representing PiS. In 2019, he became deputy minister in the now-defunct energy ministry and was a government plenipotentiary for coal mining restructuring.

In the 2019 parliamentary elections, he ran as a candidate from the PiS list for the Sejm, the lower house of parliament, winning the seat. For several months following the election, he was deputy state assets minister.

He didn’t run in last October’s parliamentary elections when PiS lost its majority.

Around 100bn zloty (€23bn) of spending by the former PiS government has been identified as raising “suspicion it was spent illegally”, says @donaldtusk.

He accused the former ruling party of using state funds “for its own political and financial benefit” https://t.co/YQVVd8GBRW

— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) August 9, 2024

During its election campaign last year, Donald Tusk’s Civic Coalition (KO) – the main group in the ruling coalition – pledged to hold the former PiS administration accountable for its various alleged abuses if elected.

This month, Tusk said that auditors examining public spending in Poland between 2016 and 2023 under PiS’s rule have so far identified 100 billion zloty (€23 billion) of expenditures that raise “suspicion it was spent illegally”.

He also noted that 62 former officials had already been charged in relation to alleged misspending, with a further 149 notifications of potential crimes submitted to prosecutors.

PiS, however, claims that it is being targeted in a political witchhunt by the new government.

Poland’s opposition PiS party has launched a website allowing people to anonymously report cases of the government violating the law https://t.co/N3JaaEbzIC

— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) August 10, 2024

Main image credit: Senat RP / flickr.com (under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

Alicja Ptak is senior editor at Notes from Poland and a multimedia journalist. She previously worked for Reuters.