Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

While trying to show his liberal face to his voters, Janusz Palikot might have instead shot himself in the foot.

The founder and president of socially liberal party Palikot's Movement wanted to remove its representative, Wanda Nowicka, from the post of deputy speaker of the Sejm (the lower house of Polish parliament). Ms Nowicka earned Mr Palikot's ire after she accepted a controversial bonus for her work in parliament. Mr Palikot wanted to replace her with Anna Grodzka, Poland's first transgender MP.

After it became clear that Ms Nowicka wouldn't be voted out of her position because all of the other parties in parliament intended to vote against her dismissal, Mr Palikot asked her to resign. She refused. "I'll accept every decision that the Sejm makes; it will be a democratic process," she told the press after meeting with Mr Palikot.

In the end, 245 MPs voted against dismissing Ms Nowicka, including Ms Grodzka, while only 45 voted to strip her of the position.

Mr Palikot fumed. "I'm sad and disappointed. I regret that she did what she did, because she destroyed herself and what she stood for." At a meeting of his party's MPs he recommended Ms Nowicka be removed from the party.

After a heated debate, the decision was postponed for this week. Mr Palikot explained that Ms Nowicka wants to "cooperate" and he's "waiting for her proposal." However, he added that he still thinks she should be removed from the party.

The issue had made headlines for the last several weeks, but Ms Grodzka kept her poise. After she was asked if she regrets not getting the chance to become the world's first transgender deputy speaker, she simply answered, "No, not at all."

Jacek Ciesnowski