Declaration of Regional Court Judge Waldemar Żurek’s attorneys
regarding the failure to transfer the case files to the Civil Chamber of the Supreme Court after the judgment of the CJEU (C-487/19)
The case files of our client, Regional Court Judge Waldemar Żurek, have remained with Małgorzata Manowska, who is acting as the First President of the Supreme Court, since 6 October 2021, namely since the ruling of the Grand Chamber of the Court of Justice of the EU in preliminary ruling case C-487/19, and she has not transferred these to the bench of the referring court in the Civil Chamber of the Supreme Court (which requested the preliminary ruling in case III CZP 25/19). This prevents the Supreme Court from issuing a ruling after receiving the preliminary ruling on EU law. Various reasons have been given for retaining the files during these few months. Recently, as proxies, we received a response from Małgorzata Manowska stating that they are with the Research and Analysis Department.
In our opinion, the failure to transfer the files to the adjudicating panel of the Supreme Court for several months, thereby blocking the ability to issue a ruling as a result of the preliminary ruling procedure, is entirely groundless and constitutes a serious breach of the European legal order, which is in force in Poland, in particular Article 267 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, in a situation in which referral of the case to the CJEU was obligatory (the referring court is the court of the last instance). The case is also of great significance to the operation of the justice system in Poland, because it applies to the status of all the so-called neo-judges, who have been defectively appointed to the Supreme Court, including Małgorzata Manowska, who has retained the case files.
On behalf of Judge Waldemar Żurek, we appeal to the EU institutions, in particular the European Commission as the “protector of the treaties”, to take appropriate steps to enable the Polish Supreme Court to promptly rule on a matter that is encompassed by EU law.
Sylwia Gregorczyk-Abram, Attorney-at-Law
Michał Wawrykiewicz, Attorney-at-Law
Warsaw, 30 December 2021