Increasingly, Polish Voters Call for Change in Politics
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Version 0 of 1. WARSAW — Poland, always eager to close the gap with its Western neighbors, has developed yet another symptom of contemporary Europeanness: a growing chunk of voters alienated from the traditional political parties and deeply disenchanted with the country’s entire political class. “It is true — we are becoming more European,” said Radoslaw Markowski, head of the Comparative Politics Department at the Institute of Political Studies at the Polish Academy of Sciences here. “Now we, too, have our own protest vote.” This was on vivid display in the first round of voting for Poland’s president two weeks ago, when the incumbent, Bronislaw Komorowski, unexpectedly finished a close second to his more conservative opponent, Andrzej Duda. Even more surprising, a well-known rock star named Pawel Kukiz, running on a platform castigating Poland’s entire political elite, drew 20 percent of the vote, finishing a strong third. “It shows that many Poles are tired of the same old political system,” said Jacek Wasilewski, a professor of political science and media at the University of Warsaw. “They feel that way about both sides, that the parties are ignorant, lacking in basic political skills and make promises that they cannot deliver.” The story will play out in the final round of voting on Sunday between the top two finishers — Mr. Komorowski, running as an independent but closely tied to the center-right ruling party, and Mr. Duda, his younger and more news media-adept challenger. And while the role of the presidency in Poland is largely ceremonial, there are growing fears within the party that has ruled the country for eight years, Civic Platform, that it faces a rough road in this fall’s much more important parliamentary elections. Recent polls have shown the presidential race to be extremely close, meaning that there is a real chance Poles will turn out a president who presided over a period when the country had the fastest growing economy in Europe. Fueling it is a growing sense among disaffected voters — especially the young, the retired and the unemployed — that the Polish economy may be vigorous, but its fruits are shared unevenly. A victory by Mr. Duda on Sunday would send an electric charge through Poland’s elite, and usher in the real prospect of a return later this year to a more right-wing, nationalistic government skeptical of stronger ties with the European Union and eager to take an even harder line against Russia. Mr. Komorowski had been expected to win re-election easily, and he ran what is widely seen as a lackluster campaign in the first round. By most accounts, Mr. Komorowski has engaged in a much more enthusiastic and combative second round, doing well in two televised debates. But it remains to be seen whether it will be enough to close the gap with Mr. Duda, whose campaign is slicker and shows more news media savvy, especially in a climate of growing voter disaffection. “His campaign thought that he would win easily, just like that,” Mr. Markowski said, and the lack of enthusiasm infected the ruling party’s supporters. The turnout in the first round was around 49 percent, the lowest in a presidential race since Poland emerged from communism in 1989. While the low turnout is being blamed largely on the sleepy first-round campaigns, another factor is that the two dominant parties come from the same side of the political spectrum. “One is conservative, and the other is very conservative,” Mr. Wasilewski said. “The people on the left have no candidate for whom they can vote with enthusiasm.” For Mr. Komorowski, this embarrassingly low turnout was both a curse and an opportunity. “Komorowski’s best chance now is to wake up the voters who doubted in him during the first round, the ones who didn’t want to go out to the polls,” Mr. Wasilewski said. “If he can get them to turn out, he wins.” For Mr. Duda, the best outcome would be to attract many of this new, energized bloc of voters who were attracted to Mr. Kukiz’s angry protest campaign. “The electorate of Pawel Kukiz craves change,” said Ewa Marciniak, a political analyst from the University of Warsaw in an interview with Gazeta Wyborcza. “And at this moment, it’s Andrzej Duda who is the closest to becoming the face of change.” Mr. Kukiz’s campaign called for some electoral reforms, but was largely an attack on the entire political establishment. So it remains unclear who these new protest voters are and what they want, other than overturning the current political order. “Some are anarchists and troublemakers who want a big bang at any expense,” Mr. Markowski said. “Others are older people with low pensions who are struggling. Many are youngsters who legitimately expect the government and the political class to take care of their job prospects. And some are xenophobic nationalists who want everything to be Polish.” It is an unruly coalition and sends a disturbing message to some Poles. “I have nephews who are of the age of typical Kukiz voters,” wrote Kuba Wojewodzki, a talk show host, comedian and Kukiz supporter, recently, “and I am sick of hearing conversations among them that goes: ‘What is cool in Warsaw? A flight to London.’” |