Michael Winiarski: the nerves on full range before a new fate for Poland

In several ways, it is a strange electoral movement that will be decided on Sunday. The opinion figures indicate that it will be extremely even between EU-friendly liberal Rafal Trzaskowski and right-wing nationalist Karol Nawrocki in an election that can determine both Poland and the entire European Future. Once again, worn out concepts such as election, nail -bites and fate selection through the air.

The exit is followed attentively in other EU and NATO countries, as Poland as a front state against Russia has become an increasingly heavier security policy player in Europe. None of the candidates want to break with the EU or NATO, but Nawrocki is more skeptical in support of Ukraine and is supported by Hungary’s Prorey Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.

At the same time, not so much is noticed The election campaign on Warsaw’s streets and squares, although the nerves are on full range. To a large extent, this is due to the « Vali Test » which has been prevalent since the night of Saturday. The last day before Election Day, Valagitation is no longer allowed.

Now it is the voters who determine Poland’s path. National Conservative President Andrzej Duda resigns this summer after two terms of office. He belonged to Jaroslaw Kaczynski’s party law and justice (PIS), which ruled the Poland government from 2015 to 2023 and which dismantled the rule of law by taking control of the independent courts and transformed the public service media into pure propaganda channels for PIS.

The presidential post has essentially a ceremonial function, but is still a strong power factor. In order for a law that Parliament assumes to come into force, it must be signed by the president. Since the parliamentary elections in October 2023, when Donald Tusk’s liberal center government took office, Duda has stopped most attempts to restore the independent judicial system with his veto right.

With Nawrocki as president is that Given that the political lock continues. The opposite applies if Trzaskowski wins. He belongs to the same political camps as Tusk, and with Trzaskowski as president, the government’s rule of law can be implemented.

With regard to the issue of migration and climate policy, the citizen platform has adapted to the more right -wing public opinion. It is also unclear what happens to the abortions, one of the issues that raised Tusk to the Prime Minister’s post. That question has barely occurred in the presidential campaign, although Trzaskowski has promised that he as president will sign a law that eases on the abortion ban.

It is exceptionally even between the candidates, with the difference within the statistical margin of error. In the last measurements, Trzaskowski is 48 percent against 47 percent for Nawrocki. Several factors still speak for a victory for Nawrocki.

On the one hand, the opinion figures, as in many other countries, usually underestimate the real support of the right -wing nationalists.

On the one hand, the right was clearly larger than the Liberals and the left in the first round of election on May 18. Nawrocki, together with the more radical nationalist Slawomir Mentzen and the open Prorean and Nyfascist Grzegorz Braun, got 51 percent of the vote, compared to 45 percent for the candidates who are close to the government.

Tusk has the last days stepped up the negative campaign against Nawrocki, rather than highlighting the benefits of Trzaskowski. Tusk’s main argument is that Nawrocki not only lacks political experience but also has such a dirty past that he is not qualified to be Poland’s head of state. Nawrocki has been accused of cheating by an elderly an apartment in Gdansk, he has participated in violent fights with football hooligans (something he does not deny) and according to media data he delivered prostitutes to guests at the Grand Hotel in the coastal city of Sopot when he worked as a doorman there.

Having so many corpses in the wardrobe is probably unsurpassed for a candidate for Poland’s highest office, but that does not prevent many from sticking to vote for Nawrocki.

I ask three women who Shopping jams in a bakery near Warsaw’s cultural palace if they believe that Nawrocki’s contact with the gangster world makes him impossible as president. Their determined response is:

– No, everyone has done stupid things when they were young. We will vote for him.

It brings to mind the equally polarized United States, where almost half of the voters did not take note that Trump was convicted of dozens of crimes, paid large amounts to hide a relationship with a porn actress and had been brought before national law twice.

Nawrocki himself made comparison with his soul mate Trump in a post on X: « Defamation in the media did not end Trump, nor will it ruin Karol Nawrocki ». But he has not been able to explain or defend his connections to the underworld.

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