When, at the 20 May session, City Council chairman Jarosław Kowalski began reading a motion signed by two groups, councillor Stanisław Wiącek, whose name appeared in it, learned not only that his colleagues had misspelled his surname, but—worse—that they had put it under a document he had never seen.
“At the session, I decided to read the motion submitted by the groups,” says Jarosław Kowalski. “When I listed the people who had signed it, Mr Wiącek interrupted me and said he had not signed such a document. In general, the names under the document can be interpreted in different ways. Either as signatures, because they are handwritten in pen, or as a list next to which councillors were supposed to sign. In any case, councillor Wiącek had no idea that his name appeared in the document at all. Confusion broke out. I announced a recess.”
Councillor Wiącek was not the only one surprised by the document. Other councillors were astonished by its contents. It turned out that they had not read the text.
“I hold my hands up: I did not read the document and signed it,” Zdzisław Abramowicz tells us.Zdzisław Abramowicz. “It is my fault; it is embarrassing. At my age, I should know that you do not sign anything without reading it. The idea behind writing the document was commendable—we wanted to learn what the situation at BOK-MCC looked like from Solidarność’s perspective (that of people affiliated with the union)—but the document was careless, contained errors and was formally incorrect. At the committee meeting, we discussed having someone from Solidarność speak at the session. A colleague was supposed to write the document, and we were to sign it. However, I believe that the City Council is not the proper body to resolve a dispute between employees and the person managing the institution,” Abramowicz explains.
Arkadiusz Krzemiński of Platforma Samorządowa also apologises. “Our idea was commendable, but the execution was shoddy. We still want to learn more about the situation at BOK-MCC and hear both sides of the conflict. We withdrew our motion because it was unprepared. I read it superficially, just glanced at it… Yes, it is my fault; I should have read the document carefully. I knew only what the idea was, not the document’s exact contents,” admits councillor Arkadiusz Krzemiński.
The motion’s initiator, councillor Łukasz Molak, believes that his colleagues are adults and should read what they sign. “I believe that in every dispute both sides should be heard, and that was my intention in proposing that the councillors submit a motion for Mr Bogusław Wojtas of Solidarność to present the matter concerning BOK-MCC at the session. The councillors who signed the motion are adults and should have familiarised themselves with the document. I am sorry that my idea fell through. There were several typos in the motion. I do not know why chairman Jarosław Kowalski, after familiarising himself with the document, did not ask us to remove them,” says Łukasz Molak.
The City Council chairman explains: “At one of the previous sessions, councillor Łukasz Molak asked what was happening at BOK-MCC. The mayor designated director Ewa Lijewska-Małachowska to answer. But the director was not appearing before the City Council as a party; she was answering the councillor’s question. I did not give Bogusław Wojtas the floor because he is a party to the conflict. There is a record of disagreements containing the positions of both sides, and councillors can familiarise themselves with them. A city council session is not the place to resolve such matters. This is a heated period. The session attracts attention. I did not want someone from Solidarność to come out and suddenly say: ‘We are fighting with Duda so that our unions remain strong.’ But which Duda? The one they supported in the election, or the one who is the head of Solidarność? Something like that could have been said at the session, and then there would have been commotion on the Internet. I do not want a City Council session to become a political marketplace,” the chairman adds.
Mayor Piotr Roman is outraged by the entire situation involving councillors signing a motion they had not read.
“When councillor Wiącek said that he had not signed the document and did not even know it, I was stunned,” says Piotr Roman. “I have been in local government for 25 years, and there has never been a situation like this. What mattered less to me was that they signed something and then withdrew; what mattered was that the councillor’s name appeared twice on the document, while the councillor knew nothing about it. No one admitted to authoring the document. I am slightly shocked and do not even know how to respond.”
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