Mirosław Orzechowski (; born 28 September 1957 in

Łódź Łódź, also rendered in English as Lodz, is a city in central Poland and a former industrial centre. It is the capital of Łódź Voivodeship, and is located approximately south-west of Warsaw. The city's coat of arms is an example of canti ...

) is a Polish politician. He was elected to

Sejm The Sejm (English: , Polish: ), officially known as the Sejm of the Republic of Poland (Polish: ''Sejm Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej''), is the lower house of the bicameral parliament of Poland. The Sejm has been the highest governing body of t ...

on 25 September 2005 getting 3474 votes in 9

district, as a candidate from the

League of Polish Families The League of Polish Families (Polish: ''Liga Polskich Rodzin'', LPR) is a conservative political party in Poland, with many far-right elements in the past. The party's original ideology was that of the National Democracy movement which was heade ...

list. In

Jarosław Kaczyński Jarosław Aleksander Kaczyński (; born 18 June 1949) is a Polish politician who is currently serving as leader of the Law and Justice party (known by its Polish acronym PiS), which he co-founded in 2001 with his twin brother, Lech Kaczyński, w ...

's government he was a deputy minister of national education.

Biography

Orzechowski promotes strong anti-

homosexual Homosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" to peop ...

views, being (together with

Roman Giertych Roman Jacek Giertych (; born 27 February 1971 in Śrem, Poland) is a Polish politician and lawyer; he was Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education until August 2007. He was a member of the Sejm (the lower house of the Polish parliament) fr ...

) a proponent of legislation banning any form of broadly defined ''promotion of homosexuality and other deviations'' in schools under threat of severe punishment - including imprisonment. He also actively pursues legislation banning any identified homosexual person from working with children in public education institutions of any level. He publicly confirmed his intentions of sacking any homosexual teacher during numerous interviews in Polish media on March 15, 2007, with the strongest statement being aired by

Radio Tok FM Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmit ...

. Orzechowski holds the

theory of evolution Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation t ...

to be false and wants to introduce teaching of

creationism Creationism is the religious belief that nature, and aspects such as the universe, Earth, life, and humans, originated with supernatural acts of divine creation. Gunn 2004, p. 9, "The ''Concise Oxford Dictionary'' says that creationism is 't ...

in schools. This led 1,135 Polish scientists to demand his dismissal as deputy minister of education. On 25 March 2008, in an interview with TVN24, he publicly proposed the idea of prohibiting sex before the age of 18 and was supported by

Ewa Sowińska Ewa Barbara Sowińska (, born 5 March 1944 in Bydgoszcz) is a Polish politician. Political career She was elected to the Sejm on 25 September 2005, getting 8536 votes in 9 Łódź district, on the League of Polish Families party list. She beca ...

in this matter. The idea was dropped from the debate after massive criticism. In June 2008 he wrote a letter to the President of Poland

Lech Kaczyński Lech Aleksander Kaczyński (; 18 June 194910 April 2010) was a Polish politician who served as the city mayor of Warsaw from 2002 until 2005, and as President of Poland from 2005 until his death in 2010. Before his tenure as president, he prev ...

, calling for revoking Polish citizenship of soccer players taking part in matches against the Poland national team. However, pursuant to Article 34 of the

Constitution of the Republic of Poland The current Constitution of Poland was founded on 2 April 1997. Formally known as the Constitution of the Republic of Poland ( pl, Konstytucja Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej), it replaced the Small Constitution of 1992, the last amended version of ...

, Poles cannot lose their citizenship without their consent. When this was brought to his attention, he proposed to change the constitution so that playing in the national football team of any other country would be interpreted as an act of voluntarily abandoning Polish citizenship. The background of this proposal was Poland's defeat against Germany in the European Football Championship 2008.

Lukas Podolski Lukas Josef Podolski (; born Łukasz Józef Podolski, , on 4 June 1985) is a German professional footballer who plays as a forward for Ekstraklasa club Górnik Zabrze. Known for his powerful and accurate left foot, he is known for his explosive ...

, whose family had left Poland when he was two and who never formally lost Polish citizenship, had scored both goals in this match. Orzechowski ran for the

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

in the

Krosno Krosno (in full ''The Royal Free City of Krosno'', pl, Królewskie Wolne Miasto Krosno) is a historical town and Krosno County, county in the Subcarpathian Voivodeship, in southeastern Poland. The estimated population of the town is 47,140 inha ...

constituency

by-election A by-election, also known as a special election in the United States and the Philippines, a bye-election in Ireland, a bypoll in India, or a Zimni election (Urdu: ضمنی انتخاب, supplementary election) in Pakistan, is an election used to f ...

on 22 June 2008 but failed to gain enough votes. On 6 March 2009 he had been charged with driving under the influence of alcohol. On 14 July 2009 he pleaded guilty to the charge and, subject to a plea agreement, he was ordered to pay a 5000 PLN fine, donate 500 PLN to a car accident relief charity and banned from driving any vehicles for three years.''Orzechowski bez prawa jazdy'', rp.pl z 14 lipca 2009
/ref>

References

External links

Poradzimy sobie bez tolerancji
interview with Orzechowski by

Gazeta Wyborcza ''Gazeta Wyborcza'' (; ''The Electoral Gazette'' in English) is a Polish daily newspaper based in Warsaw, Poland. It is the first Polish daily newspaper after the era of "real socialism" and one of Poland's newspapers of record, covering the g ...

in October 2006
English translation
{{DEFAULTSORT:Orzechowski, Miroslaw 1957 births Living people Politicians from Łódź Members of the Polish Sejm 2005–2007 League of Polish Families politicians Christian creationists 21st-century Polish criminals Polish Roman Catholics Councillors in Łódź

Biography

See also

References

External links