"As you may be aware, Jaroslaw Kaczynski is starting his tour again soon," Tomczyk (pictured) said at a press conference.
Cezary Tomczyk/PAP

An inspection of the level of security afforded by the Polish police to the ruling party leader has revealed “appalling data,” an opposition MP has said.

Cezary Tomczyk, an MP with the main opposition group, the centrist Civic Coalition (KO), on Monday presented a report on the involvement of police in protecting Jaroslaw Kaczynski, leader of the ruling conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party, during his political rallies held across the country last year.

“As you may be aware, Jaroslaw Kaczynski is starting his tour again soon,” Tomczyk said at a press conference.

“A few days ago we received information on how many police officers are deployed to protect those visits and the data are appalling,” Tomczyk said, adding that he had sent requests for information on the matter to all province police commanders, and only one of them had responded in detail.

“The rest are afraid,” he said.

The data show that 292 police officers were deployed to protect Kaczynski’s visit in Chojnice on December 8, 2022, and 828 were sent to monitor the official ceremony of opening a new canal on the Vistula Spit on September 17, 2022, where Kaczynski was present along with the president and the prime minister, Tomczyk went on to say.

“These data are terrifying and they show that the state police have been turned into the PiS police,” Tomczyk said, adding that “the whole state apparatus has been used to protect party events at the expense of the state.”

Piotr Kaleta, a PiS MP, responded in a conversation with PAP that “Jaroslaw Kaczynski could have no police protection if we had a normal opposition in Poland.

“How can we allow for a band of unruly ruffians to hurt him, to allow for hordes of hostile people to approach him,” Kaleta continued.

Kaleta added that “Jaroslaw Kaczynski must be protected for the good of Poland.”