WARSAW, Poland (ChurchMilitant.com) – Hundreds of thousands of Poles traveled to the capital city of Warsaw on Jan. 11 to march for their freedom.
A protester’s sign denounced recent arrests of
anti-corruption leaders in the Polish Parliament
Busloads of patriots came from Kraków, Łódź, Wrocław, Poznań, Lublin and Białystok. They marched toward the Sejm, the Polish Parliament, in the cold and snow.
They wore scarves imprinted with the crowned, white eagle of the Polish crest and carried the country’s red and white flag.
They came to protest the violations of law made against their sovereign nation by the new globalist prime minister, Donald Tusk, often called the darling of the European Union.
One Pole told Church Militant the protesters “know in their hearts” that “Tusk aims to import countless illegal immigrants, who do not care about Polish traditions, to expand Poland’s abortion laws and to infect Polish children with LGBT propaganda.”
But they chanted “We will win” and sang the Polish national anthem, “Mazurek Dąbrowskiego,” also known by its first line, “Poland Is Not Yet Lost.” The crowds sang “Te Deum,” the ancient hymn of thanks and praise to God, and it resounded through the city razed by the Nazis in WWII.
They marched and protested peacefully in keeping with President Andrzej Duda’s appeal “to remain calm, despite the brutal actions of Donald Tusk’s government.”
He was referring to the recent arrest of two top anti-corruption members of Parliament (MPs) — Mariusz Kamiński and Maciej Wąsik — less than a month after the new government took control in December, as well as the ruling coalition’s recent seizure and liquidation of public media in the strongly Catholic nation.
Protesters packed Warsaw’s streets
Polish leaders, including the Law and Order (PiS) Party president and former prime minister, Jarosław Kaczyński, rendezvoused with the patriots at Sejm, delivering rousing speeches (excerpts are below).
PiS President Jarosław Kaczyński, who spoke first, warned the Poles of the dangers of Tusk’s plans:
It is important for Poles to know this … . [Tusk’s coalition plans to carry] out such a plan that will combine two elements — practical liquidation of our homeland as a Polish state — these are European plans for the new EU structure, but the strongest want it — [and] that the entire EU be directly subordinated to them. … It is a horror, we are to lose all rights in all important areas of political and social life. This will be the area where Poles live.
A member of the Sejm, Zbigniew Bogucki, roused the protesters to resist the machinations of the new coalition:
We must say NO to these usurpers. Tell Tusk … NO. Say NO lawlessness. They will not stop themselves; you citizens must stop them. My nation — a free nation — will stop them! There are hundreds of thousands of us here and in this way we show that you are Poland!
Another member of the Sejm, Przemysław Czarnek, cast aspersions on Tusk and his recent arrest and incarceration of the anti-corruption MPs.
He exhorted:
[The assembled protesters want] to tell you that you are guilty of what is happening in Poland today and what the whole world is looking at — that you, along with others, led to the fact that, from the presidential palace, they were abducted unlawfully, with violation of all rules — all norms, legal and ethical.
Czarnek continued:
[A]ll who stand behind this attack on the Constitution, the rule of law, democracy — listen to one thing. You can change the structure of the state. You can fill the functions and positions with new hubs of these functions. You can change curators, public media authorities, but only in accordance with the law — only in accordance with the Constitution.
In praise of the thousands assembled, he declared:
This nation that came here, which exercises supreme authority, are cultural people, they are not barbarians, people who walked this street with profanity on their lips. These are not people who can only scream eight stars [a profane expression used by the pro-abortion movement in Poland]. They are cultural people who have fought for Poland for decades. And you take them for nothing because you don’t take the nation respectfully.
At the end of the day, Kaczyński posted on X:
Thank you, and please remember that this fight will not be easy and that you will have to be here more than once, maybe also in other places in Poland. It will be necessary to mobilize strongly to win the next local government elections, elections to the European Parliament, or presidential elections and defeat this evil once and for all.
One Polish social media influencer summed up the day,
Over 300,000 participants Protest of Free Poles and:
-0 damaged cars, benches, paving slabs, barriers, etc.
-0 policemen shouted at and spat at
-0 vulgar and vulgar slogans
-0 threats against political opponents.
Only white and red flags, smiles, mutual respect and singing patriotic songs together.
But we are the backward and dark barbary from the east …
There was a livestream of the protest on TV Republika, a privately owned station.
“At the moment it’s an important source of information for many viewers apart from some internet pages,” a contact in Poland told Church Militant.
Church Militant will continue to cover this developing story. Previous coverage can be found here and here.