The first EU pandemic recovery funds under Poland’s National Recovery Plan (KPO) could come to Poland late in the first quarter or early in the second quarter of 2024, the new funds minister said.
The new Polish pro-EU government, which took office in mid-December, was determined to mend relations with Brussels, which had been strained by the previous Euro-sceptic Law and Justice (PiS) government over PiS’s judicial reforms that the EU said violated the rule of law. This has led to the EU freezing of KPO funds for Poland.
The new government has already filed for the first tranche of the KPO funds on top of a EUR 5-billion advance already promised by the EU.
Katarzyna Pelczynska-Nalecz, the funds and regional policy minister, said on December 22 that the Ministry of Justice had already prepared a path for the fulfillment of the conditions set by the EU to make the release of money possible.
“The first payment we have requested is PLN 31 billion,” the minister said.
“The fundamental issue that will be resolved and which will result in these funds coming to Poland somewhere at the end of the first or the beginning of the second quarter of 2024, is the rule of law,” Pelczynska-Nalecz added.
“We are not doing this for the EU, for some abstract commission to put conditions on us,” she said. “The rule of law is something that Polish citizens need. In reaching it, we will also simultaneously fulfil the assumptions on the basis of which we gain access to KPO funds.”
According to Pelczynska-Nalecz, the government plans to submit four KPO payment applications next year – two on each of the possible dates.
“That is, a second and a third (application) in the first half of the year, then a fourth and a fifth to make up for lost time,” Pelczynska-Nalecz explained. (PAP/Business World Magazine)