The clash erupted after President Nawrocki refused to sign promotions to the first officer rank for members of the Internal Security Agency (ABW) and the Military Counterintelligence Service (SKW).
Government officials said the decision affected 136 officers due to receive their promotions ahead of Poland’s Independence Day on November 11.
The president has claimed that the prime minister had banned intelligence chiefs from meeting with him.
Tomasz Siemoniak, minister in charge of coordinating special services, denied that Nawrocki had been cut off from information.
He said cooperation between the head of state and the agencies was governed by law, which does not provide for individual briefings between the president and the service heads.
Presidential spokesman Rafał Leśkiewicz argued, however, that the law clearly requires agency heads to immediately inform both the president and the prime minister about matters of significant importance to national and international security.
He accused Tusk and his associates of using "rhetoric based on falsehoods and manipulation."
"For the first time in the history of the Third Republic, the heads of special services have declined the President’s invitation to meetings on key national security issues. The President has been cut off from access to information," Leśkiewicz wrote on social media.
He added that the meetings were also meant to address the pending officer promotion requests.
Siemoniak countered that the official letters from the presidential office did not mention promotions among the topics for discussion.
Prime Minister Tusk confirmed on Friday that President Nawrocki had refused to approve the 136 promotions.
"They were supposed to receive their first officer ranks before November 11. They won’t – I don’t know why. This is just another chapter in the president’s conflict with the government," Tusk said in a video posted on the social media platform X.
"Winning an election isn’t enough to be a president," he added.
The dispute highlights growing friction between President Nawrocki, a conservative historian and former head of the Institute of National Remembrance (IPN), and Tusk’s centrist government, just days before Poland’s Independence Day celebrations.
(ał)
Source: IAR