The director of the Polish public television broadcaster TVP, who sparked controversy over his ties with the extreme right, has been criticized by leading Polish public figures. Marek Edelman, the last surviving commander of the 1943 Warsaw Jewish ghetto uprising against the occupying German forces, and renowned film director Andrzej Wajda were among the dozen figures who blasted TVP head Piotr Farfal.
"In a democratic state, we cannot tolerate that public office be held by people who publicly endorse racism and anti-Semitism, who praise Nazism, and have never renounced such views," Edelman wrote in the daily 'Gazeta Wyborcza'. Wajda, writing in the same newspaper, said that having Farfal at the helm of TVP was "shameful and a scandal" for Poland, calling him a "former fascist" whose views ran counter to Poles' tradition of resisting totalitarianism. Film directors Agnieszka Holland, Kazimierz Kutz and Ryszard Krauze, as well as actor Andrzej Seweryn, also lashed out at Farfal. Krauze said he would be boycotting TVP and called on fellow Poles not to watch its broadcasts on 3 May when Poland's commemorates its constitution of 1791.
Farfal, a 31-year-old lawyer, was formerly a skinhead activist and editor of far-right magazines. He was named to TVP's board in 2006 by the ultra-Catholic League of Polish Families, before the three-party government of which it was part lost power in 2007. He was promoted to the top of TVP as a result of a spat among other board members and had since brought on board other individuals tied to the League of Polish Families. In Februrary, the French-German culture channel Arte suspended cooperation with TVP, saying it did not share Farfal's views.
