It remains exciting after the presidential election in Poland. Incumbent Andrzej Duda won the vote, but missed the absolute majority. In two weeks he will have to run against his challenger in a runoff election.
The Poles will have to vote on their new president in a runoff election in two weeks. In the first round of voting, none of the candidates secured an absolute majority. Incumbent Andrzej Duda, who is supported by the national conservative governing party PiS, was forecast to receive 41.8 percent of the vote in Sunday’s vote. His challenger, Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski, won 30.4 percent of the vote. Trzaskowski had started for the liberal-conservative opposition coalition coalition (KO).
Voter turnout was very high despite the corona pandemic. According to the election commission, almost 48 percent of those entitled to vote cast their vote on Sunday afternoon. In the 2015 presidential election, the total turnout was around 49 percent at the end of the day. The official final result should be announced no later than Wednesday morning.
The presidential election was originally scheduled for May 10. However, it was temporarily postponed due to the corona pandemic after a violent political dispute. In April and May, PiS was still able to assume, according to opinion polls, that Duda would get more than 50 percent of the vote in the first ballot and secure a second term in office.
Rafal Trzaskowski, Mayor of Warsaw and presidential candidate from Poland’s largest opposition alliance. (Source: Piotr Nowak / PAP / dpa)
“We still have a chance to win.”
Even if, according to forecasts, the result is now significantly worse, the PiS Duda supporters celebrated on election evening in Lowicz, west of Warsaw. Duda said it was important that the country be run as the majority of the population wanted. He congratulated his challenger Trzaskowski on his success.
Trzaskowski was nominated by the KO only after the election date was postponed as a presidential candidate. The popular Warsaw city colonel quickly became Duda’s most dangerous challenger. On election evening, the 48-year-old told supporters in Warsaw that the result showed that a high percentage of Poles wanted to switch. “We still have a chance to win.” The second round would be a choice between those who looked into the past to spark controversy and those who wanted Poland to bring a better future.
Incumbent Duda outraged with homophobia
A deciding factor for the outcome of the run-off election could be who the voters of the applicants who have now left are deciding. Independent candidate Szymon Holownia, who finished third, said he would not vote for Duda himself, but did not want to dictate anything to his followers. He wanted to talk to Trzaskowski about whether he supported important points in his election program. Then the voters could make their own decision. A spokesman for the candidate Krzysztof Bosak from the right-wing populist Konfederacja (7.4 percent) said that no election recommendation would be made.
According to two opinion polls commissioned by the public broadcaster TVP and the private television station TVN Info, Duda would currently have a better chance of winning the runoff.
Duda, who has been in office for five years, presented himself in the election campaign as a guarantee for the receipt of the social benefits introduced by the PiS government. The 48-year-old emphasized the traditional image of the family and rejected marriage for everyone. Duda had recently caused outrage abroad with homophobic statements. He said about gays, lesbians, bisexuals and trans people: “We are being tried to convince them that they are people. But it is just an ideology.”
His political rival Trzaskowski, who represents the largest opposition alliance, the liberal-conservative citizens’ coalition (KO), signed the so-called “LGBT +” charter, which is supposed to support sexual minorities, as the mayor of the capital. In the election campaign, however, he avoided placing this issue in the foreground so as not to deter conservative voters. In the event of an election victory, Trzaskowski wants to reverse the controversial judicial reform of the PiS, which has brought Poland into a permanent clinch with the EU.
President has far-reaching powers
The election was also seen as a kind of referendum on the politics of the PiS, which has been the president since 2015 and has an absolute majority in parliament. A second term in Duda would underpin the party’s monopoly on power until the next parliamentary election in 2023.
The office of Polish President is not purely representative, the President has extensive powers and can not only veto laws, but also initiate his own legislative initiatives.
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