Polish PM plays football instead of voting in parliament
Published 10 March, 2009, 13:01
Poland’s Prime Minister has to pay a €60 fine and to apologize for skipping a parliamentary vote to play football with his friends.
On Thursday Donald Tusk was caught on tape by Polish TVN24 channel’s reporters when kicking the ball together with the parliament deputy Roman Kosecki and Tomasz Arabski, head of the Chancellery of the Prime Minister, Russian utro.ru website said.
At the same time in Sejm (the Polish parliament) a poll on pension plans was under way.
The Prime Minister had to officially apologize and promised it would never happen again.
“I can’t find words to justify my behavior,” he said.
When President Lech Kaczynski, Tusk’s political rival, was informed about the matter, he asked whether the Prime Minister has “at least scored a couple of goals”.
Tusk is an avid football fan and plays regularly with friends from his Civic Platform party and from his hometown of Gdansk, the Associated Press said.
The parliament speaker, Bronislaw Komorowski, said Tusk didn’t know about the poll as it must had been held on another day, and it was supposed to be the Prime Minister’s spare time.
Nevertheless, deputies ruled to fine Donald Tusk. The same happens to every member of the parliament who misses a poll.
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