Everyone who wants to change the abortion law this year supports the referendum; the president cannot veto the result, Sejm chairman Szymon Hołownia said on social media.
President Andrzej Duda, asked during Tuesday’s interview on Polsat News whether he allows the liberalization of abortion laws, said that “abortion is the deprivation of human life and if someone demands abortion, he demands for him the right to kill.”
Today, the law provides the option of terminating a pregnancy, that is, de facto depriving the child of life in the womb, if this poses a threat to the woman’s life. From this point of view, the woman’s life safety is assured
– he explained.
He added that “there should not be a referendum on matters of life and death.” However, he did not answer when asked whether he would take the outcome of the referendum into account if it were to take place. When asked about the morning-after pill law, he said he would analyze the amendment, “but he would not sign the law that introduces unhealthy, sick and dangerous regulations for children.” According to him, the ‘morning after’ pill, which is available without a prescription for minors, is ‘a gross exaggeration’.
On Wednesday, Sejm Chairman Szymon Hołownia commented on these statements on social media.
The president’s statement on the morning-after pill leaves no illusions: he will veto any liberalization of rights that comes from this Sejm. Everyone who wants to change the abortion law this year supports the referendum. The president cannot veto the outcome. This is our right
– wrote the Marshal of the Sejm on platform X.
The amendment to the Pharmaceutical Law, which was supported by the Senate last week, provides for the availability of one of the hormonal contraceptives – ulipristal acetate – for people over 15 years of age. The accompanying tablet (ellaOne) may be taken up to 120 hours after sexual intercourse. As of July 2017, the so-called morning-after pills are only available on prescription in Poland. The essence of the remedies under consideration amounts to repealing this provision.
Projects about abortion
Regarding the liberalization of abortion regulations, the left submitted two bills in November last year. One of them partially decriminalizes abortion and its assistance, the other allows termination of pregnancy until the end of the twelfth week of its duration.
End of January this year. A project by a group of MPs from the Civic Coalition parliamentary club was submitted to the Sejm. It is assumed that a pregnant person is entitled to health care in the form of termination of pregnancy during the first twelve weeks of pregnancy.
In addition to these projects, Trzecia Droga (PSL and Polska 2050) submitted a bill to the Sejm at the end of February that reverses the Constitutional Court’s 2020 ruling on abortion regulations. TD politicians also want a referendum to be held on abortion.
Anti-abortion rules in force in Poland since 1993 were amended following the October 2020 Constitutional Court ruling. Previously, the Law on Family Planning, Protection of the Human Fetus and Conditions for the Permissibility of Termination of Pregnancy, known as the Abortion Compromise , also allowed abortion in the case of severe and irreversible fetal impairment or an incurable disease threatening his life. The Constitutional Tribunal ruled that this ground for termination of pregnancy was unconstitutional, sparking a wave of protests across the country.
tkwl/PAP/X
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Source: wPolityce