Comment on the Warsaw visa scandal: Poland is now a country of immigration

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung Comment on the Warsaw visa scandal: Poland is now a country of immigration Article by Gerhard Gnauck • 23 hours Polish Prime Minister Morawiecki at an event in September When opposition leader Donald Tusk accused the Polish government in early summer of bringing too many migrant workers to Poland, it seemed like a bold election campaign somersault. Of all people, the right-wing government under Mateusz Morawiecki, which vehemently rejects any redistribution of migrants by Brussels, is said to have secretly and possibly illegally brought migrants into the country? So in the end, were the Elche's biggest critics themselves? Today, three weeks before the end of a dramatic election campaign, it is clear: Tusk has unleashed an avalanche. He speaks of 250,000 work visas that have been issued since 2021, primarily in Eastern Europe and Asia. This happened through intermediary companies, through pressure from employers and accelerated through bribes. Hardly one percent of these are Schengen visas. These would allow people to travel to Germany, for example, and Schengen multiple entry visas even make it possible to get to Mexico. The government is extremely nervous The Polish government reacted very nervously. She fired Foreign State Secretary Piotr Wawrzyk, who was responsible for consular affairs. He is said to be in the hospital, rumored to have attempted suicide. Other people in the ministry were fired or taken into custody. Three weeks before the parliamentary elections on October 15, the ruling PiS is under great pressure. Their efforts for external, internal and social security, which still make them the strongest party in the polls with around 35 percent of the vote, are being dangerously counteracted. The extent of the affair is still not clear. Are Indians on Schengen visas posing as Bollywood actors the tip of a big iceberg of corruption? Or are the “several hundred cases” in which Poland’s public prosecutor’s office has been investigating for a long time a small tip without an iceberg? Warsaw migration researcher and well-known PiS critic Maciej Duszczyk seems to be one of the few to keep a cool head. He warned this week against equating incorrect or expedited visa issuances for urgently sought workers with illegal, corrupt practices that involve money-losing. Incidentally, Poland is currently in the process of changing from a country of emigration to a country of immigration. It is very much to be hoped that the mistakes made by France or Germany can be avoided. Counter with Lampedusa Years ago, the PiS announced that it would give preference to “integration-friendly” migrants. Therefore, Indians, Turks, Vietnamese, Filipinos, Central Asians were brought in, while the largest groups of foreigners in the country for many years have been Ukrainians and Belarusians. But the bellicose rhetoric of the election campaign is more audible than Duszczyk these days. While the liberal media is reporting on the visa scandal, the state-affiliated television TVP is focusing intensively on the situation on Lampedusa. It is likely that the migration issue will influence the election outcome. With around forty percent of non-voters in the country, it is difficult to say which coalition will be possible in the end. Be that as it may, Poland has now found itself in the dilemma of overcoming a labor shortage and at the same time integrating migrants well.