Polish central bank governor labels charges in tribunal motion ‘baseless’
By Karol Badohal
WARSAW (Reuters) – Poland’s central bank governor dismissed the charges against him in a motion which seeks to bring him before a State Tribunal as “baseless” on Friday, as he laid out a cautious path ahead for interest rates.
The motion submitted to parliament’s speaker last month set in train an unprecedented process that could result in Governor Adam Glapinski being removed from his post.
The charges facing Glapinski include lacking independence from the previous government, breaking constitutional rules that prevent the central bank from financing government borrowing when it undertook a quantitative easing programme during the COVID-19 pandemic, and misleading the finance ministry about the bank’s financial results.
Glapinski hit back on Friday in his monthly press conference, held after the National Bank of Poland (NBP) left its main interest rate on hold at 5.75% for the sixth month in a row.
“They are completely baseless, easy to refute, and seem to have been written hastily,” Glapinski said of the charges.
He said that if the NBP had not used quantitative easing during the pandemic Poland’s subsequent economic growth would have been weaker and he dismissed the idea that he had deliberately misled the finance ministry.
