CGFLI: a needs-based or a politics-based scheme?

With no cap on the grants or detailed project selection criteria or the need to explain the reasons for the scores, the Committee’s only duty was to "consider" topics such as: • principle of sustainable development, • comprehensive nature of investment projects, • reduction in emissions and the level of the project’s impact on the environment, • cost of the project in relation to the authority’s p. [...] And so when local authorities are viewed from the perspective of the political colour, the "political bias" of competition results was even stronger than in the case of the criterion of presidential election results. [...] Those with the strongest links to the ruling party include the mayor of Mysłowice Dariusz Wójtowicz (member of Mateusz Morawiecki’s honorary committee for the parliamentary election) and the mayor of Świętochłowice Daniel Beger (member of Andrzej Duda’s honorary committee in Silesia for the presidential election). [...] The recurring pattern was as follows: the closer the local authority was to the ruling party, the more they benefitted from the CGFLI. [...] The open question is if this is related to the fact that the city’s mayor is the constituency’s only mayor to be a member of the Civic Platform.