Unmasked: health minister ‘defends’ cronyism?
18:21
Łukasz Szumowski, Poland’s health minister, has vehemently denied claims of cronyism, and in an attempt to mollify the ongoing controversy, he adopted an emollient tone in his interview for the well-known Polish daily, “Dziennik Gazeta Prawna”.
As the scandal about buying “defective” masks that were bought to battle the coronavirus pandemic unravels, Szumowski explained his decision on May 18 saying that he would “even buy masks from the devil”.
On May 12, “Gazeta Wyborcza”, a widely-read Polish national newspaper, reported that the health ministry bought 100,000 masks for PLN 5 million from a family friend of Szumowski, that were later found to be “useless”. The ministry confirmed the deal mentioned in the report, and on May 13, a day after the daily published the piece, notified a Warsaw prosecutor of a possible crime.
The opposition and critics have been quick to point out that the ministry only informed the prosecutor after the newspaper reported the allegedly questionable transaction and accused the health minister of “defending” cronyism.
