Polish president sued for ‘insulting’ his own people
A Polish-based NGO has filed a lawsuit against President Andrzej Duda, accusing him of insulting his own people in a comment he made about a 2023 film on migration.
In a post on Sunday on X, the Center for Monitoring Racist and Xenophobic Behavior (OMZRIK) said they plan to make Duda “the first president to be brought to court by Poles.”
The ‘insult’ in question was made by Duda in 2023 in a comment about the feature film ‘Green Border’ by award-winning director Agnieszka Holland, which depicts the migrant crisis on the Polish border. The film tells the story of refugees from the Middle East and Africa attempting to enter the EU through the Belarus-Poland border.
The film was highly criticized in Poland, with the country’s ruling party at the time, the right-wing Law and Justice (PiS), accusing Holland of slandering Polish border guards. In an interview with public broadcaster TVP, Duda apparently called the film’s viewers “pigs.”
“The fact that Ms. Holland portrays Polish officials who are performing their duties for Polish society, for the safety of all of us and the security of Poland, I am not surprised that the Border Guard officers who watched this film used the slogan ‘Only pigs sit in the cinema,’” Duda said at the time. He later clarified that these were not his words but a quote, originally associated with opposition to Nazi propaganda films shown in Poland during World War II.
OMZRiK, however, saw Duda’s words as an “insult.”
“Andrzej Duda… insulted millions of Poles by calling them pigs. The Polish president called people who are citizens of his own country this... Let’s take Duda to court now,” the NGO said in their post.
The NGO announced on Sunday that the District Court in Warsaw has set October 24, 2025 as the date for the first hearing of Duda’s trial. By that time, Duda’s second five-year term as president will have expired – he will hold office until August 2025, and cannot run again.
Experts say the case could result in Duda having to make an official apology or pay compensation for damages.
‘Green Border’ was an international co-production between companies in Poland, the Czech Republic, France, and Belgium. It competed for the Golden Lion at the Venice International Film Festival and won the Special Jury Prize.
The migrant crisis on the Poland-Belarus border has been brewing since 2021. Warsaw has accused Minsk of deliberately organizing migrants from Africa and the Middle East and sending them towards the border with the goal of “destabilizing Poland and other EU member states.” Minsk has denied the claims, while accusing the Polish authorities of violent treatment of asylum seekers.
