MP lights up cannabis incense instead of joint in parliament

Janusz Palikot in Room 143: photo - PAP/Jacek Turczyk

The MP, the head of the Palikot Movement which gained 10 percent of the vote in the 9 October elections last year, threatened to light up a joint in committee room 143 in the parliament building today to test new laws introduced last year which gave police and prosecutors discretion as to whether to punish those caught in possession of small amounts of soft drugs.

After speaker of the lower house of parliament (Sejm) Ewa Kopacz, informed prosecutors that Palikot was proposing to possibly break the law, the MP backed off, lighting up incense instead.

"It had a bit of marijuana in it and smelled of marijuana,” said Palikot, a libertarian politician who left the ruling centre-right Civic Platform because he thought it was too conservative on social issues.

"Someone says they're going to smoke a joint in the Sejm and the security is tamped up as if it were a national emergency,” Palikot said, adding that this was the first time since 1928 that police had entered Sejm terrain.

The MP, elected on a libertarian ticket last September, said the stunt was part of a campaign to legalize possession of marijuana in Poland.

Palikot had also invited members of the Free Hemp Society to share a joint with him.

In December last year, legislation was passed giving prosecutors a choice over whether to charge people found in possession of soft drugs “for their own personal use” or not.

Third place in elections last year with 10 percent of the vote, Palikot’s Movement wants to repeal various restrictions on individual freedoms, including possession and smoking of cannabis. (pg/nh)