Poland’s far-right government has postponed the entry into force of the Constitutional Court’s (CoC) decision which virtually prohibited the right to abortion in Poland. This postponement happened thanks to the mass protests in the streets of Warsaw and eighty other cities in Poland and abroad in recent weeks. You can see it in this photographic report by Rozalia Sasor.
When the decision of the highest Polish court is implemented, it will no longer be possible to have an abortion in case of fetal malformation, which represents more than 90% of all abortions performed legally. With this ruling Poland would become the European country with the most restrictive legislation on abortion because abortion would only be legally permitted if the health of the mother is in danger, if the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest. These represent approximately 5%.
The court’s ruling should have been published on Monday in the country’s official newspaper. From the Prime Minister’s office, they have said that the sentence needs more time for dialogue to try and find a new position at such a difficult issue for the country. Polish feminists had already warned a few days ago that the dominant party in government and the Catholic Church needed to find a new path, not consulted publicly, which has been the Constitutional one.
Since the end of October, the protests have taken to streets day after day with one single slogan Strajk Kobiet – Women’s Strike. In the next issue of “La Independent”, we will offer you two interviews with two Polish gender experts from which we will give you a preview of some contents. One of the interviewees is Rozalia Sasori, Head of the Centre for Catalan Studies at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow. The other is Iwona Koscielecka, a doctoral student at the University of Gdansk and a member of the Board of Directors of the Global Institute for Research, Education and Scholarship GIRES in Amsterdam.
“This is a cruel and violent sentence because it violates women’s basic human rights,” says Koscielecka. She adds that the Polish Minister of Education has officially said that “women are to deliver children” and not to think. Unfortunately, the idea of “protecting life” of this government is a smokescreen that wants to control female sexuality, does not see women as partners of discussion and human beings conscious of their rights. It is a hypocrisy and the strong need for control of the union of the PIS government, of the fundamentalist Catholic Church and of the ultra-conservative organization Ordo Iuris, known for bringing LGBT rights activists to justice.
In Poland, Iwona Koscielecka continues, the government tries to take away step by step the freedom of expression, the female right to dignity or the prohibition of medical experiments without consent which are all in Polish Constitution and that all women and people should have. The politicians of the ruling party hide behind “the life of the fetus” and with this statement they infantilize the image of women in the media and reduce the role of women to incubators and service which revels and unmasks a great contempt towards women in general, concludes Koscielecka.
For her part, Rozalia Sasori, head of the Centre for Catalan Studies at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, states that “The women’s movement in our country has already shown in 2016 that it can influence political decisions. So, I hope that all these strikes will be a beginning of great structural changes in Polish society”
The Strajk Kobiet – Women’s Strike – calls for a substantial change in the legislation that should define women’s rights. I guess we are going through a situation similar to that in Ireland a few years ago, and also in Spain. So, I am convinced that we must not stop so that the future of women in Poland can also change.
In Spain, from ARQUERES REBELS, the intersectional feminist assembly in Mataró, Maresme, we stand in solidarity with all Polish women who are currently fighting for their rights. The government of this state has been cutting back the human rights with impunity for years, and now it is the turn for women to have voice concerning their reproductive rights.
The new reform directly attacks the right to decide about one’s own body, mental health and forces Polish women to carry out clandestine abortions that can end their lives. Tough restrictions are needed against the sexists and fundamentalist part of the government of Poland from the international community, and solidarity with the affected and struggling protesters, both women and men supporting them.
