Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced that his government will officially make an effort to bring the Olympic Games to Poland. The idea was met with mixed comments from politicians and the media, mostly because of other urgent spending such as military modernisation, energy transformation and transport infrastructure.  

A realistic perspective [for Poland to organise Olympic Games] taking into account the already made preliminary decisions, commitments and declarations of the International Olympic Committee, is 2040 or 2044” Prime Minister said. 

Polish Finance Minister Andrzej Domański was very careful in his comments about the idea. 

“I believe that this is a big project that needs to be tested for economic viability. Experience shows that many countries and cities hosting the Olympic Games do not make money economically,” the Finance Minister said.

“I like the idea of pursuing big goals and for me such a goal is to radically improve the quality of education in Poland by, for example, increasing salaries. Such a great goal is also the transformation of the Polish energy system so that energy is cheaper in Poland and Polish companies are competitive in international markets,” Minister Domański added.

Meanwhile, the Polish opposition criticised the idea as a show of hypocrisy, because of the government’s recent narrative to cut unnecessary spending which it accused the previous Law and Justice government. 

“Today’s decision on further efforts in this regard stands in contrast to earlier statements by the Civic Platform about megalomania in investments or events,” – said Piotr Muller, the former spokesman of the PiS government.

“At the same time, it is worth noting that precisely in terms of organising such a large event, it is necessary to build an appropriate transport infrastructure. The construction of the CPK – in terms of the airport and the railway lines – would be extremely helpful here,” Müller added, calling for more efforts to build the Central Communication Port, which was the project initiated by the previous Polish government. 

Most media commentators praised the idea but also reminded about Poland’s current investment commitments in energy transformation and infrastructure. 

Source: PAP, X

Tomasz Modrzejewski

Photo: British Poles