PM Morawiecki "opens" a bridge open for months. It's yet another such ceremony

PM Morawiecki took part in an "opening ceremony" of a bridge over Dunajec River in Tylmanowa. What's interesting here is that local residents have been using the bridge for a few months now. Ochotnica Dolna Municipality Mayor Tadeusz Królczyk informed about the "historic" first crossing of the bridge in Tylmanowa already back on Dec. 23, 2022.

"The festive opening of the bridge is today. That's because project commissioning with technical committee present is one thing, and simple opening for use is another, while festive opening - when you invite everyone who was somehow involved in this investment - is something completely different," Królczyk told TVN24

The bridge has not been first investment marked such "grand opening" ceremony attended by government officials.

Konkret24 wrote on April 28, 2023, that "PiS politicians have set out across the country to get photographed and give away public money" as well as "visit commonly-respected firefighters to whom they give fire engines" and, what's important, "sometimes 'give' even those (engines - edit.) that have already been in use for months at those stations". 

In May 2022, Minister of Family and Social Affairs Marlena Maląg boasted about a new fire engine that was just officially christened at the local fire station in Sobótka, Greater Poland. The vehicle was not new at all - it has been used by the fire service since 2019.

Later that year, in September, Education Minister Przemysław Czarnek informed on social media he had taken part in a ceremony of handing over of a new vehicle to fire service in Goszczanów, Łódź province. It turned out the local firefighters had accepted this vehicle already back in November 2020.

That same month, PM Morawiecki "opened" the bridge over Kamienica River in Szczawa, Lesser Poland. According to auto-swiat.pl, there would not be anything unusual about it, "except the brigde was opened to traffic at the end of December 2021".

In February 2022, tvn24.pl wrote about a ceremony in Jarosław, Subcarpathian Voivodeship, where local police wanted to celebrate receiving new police cars. The problem was one of the vehicles had been sent over to help patrol the Polish-Belarusian border, and so the officers borrowed a similar-looking vehicle from another station and changes its license plates so it better resembled the missing car.

Another interesting situation took place during the opening of a roundabout in Katowice in April 2021, attended by prime minister Morawiecki. According to katowice24.pl, the investment "was supposed to be open to use in mid-2019", and "it has been open to traffic at the end of last year". The moto.pl portal said the ceremony had been stolen by a motorist who diverted the spectator's attention away from the prime minister". How did he manage to do that? He drove around the roundabout in his rare Ferrari F40. Only 1,315 such cars have been made and "each one is worth approx. seven million zlotys".

In June 2018, tvn24.pl found out police in Sejny received a police car from the then Deputy Minister of the Interior Jarosław Zieliński at an official ceremony. However, they had to wash the vehicle real well as it was already in use for two months.

A peculiar situation took place in July 2017 when the then Prime Minister Beata Szydło "opened" the dam in Świnna Poręba, Lesser Poland. "What could not be achieved in 30 years, Law and Justice government finished in two months," Szydło said at the time. The problem is that same dam had already been opened once before by Civic Platform. On top of that, according to money.pl, local mayors claimed there was "still a lot do to complete the investement".