The centrist and nationalist candidates vying for the Polish presidency were neck and neck, exit polls showed on Sunday, each predicting victory in a vote with major implications for Poland’s pro-EU government.A projection by Ipsos including some partial results showed nationalist historian Karol Nawrocki narrowly ahead with 50.7 percent against 49.3 percent for Warsaw’s liberal mayor Rafal Trzaskowski.An earlier exit poll by Ipsos had put the 53-year-old Trzaskowski ahead with 50.3 percent against 49.7 percent for the 42-year-old Nawrocki.”There’s a sleepless night ahead of us,” Dorota Loboda, a lawmaker for Trzaskowski’s Civic Coalition, said at the candidate’s election night rally.Election officials forecast that the final result will only be known early on Monday.”We won… by a whisker,” Trzaskowski told supporters after the first exit poll was published. “I said it would be very close,” he added, thanking his voters.Nawrocki said: “We will win during the night.”We will win and we will save Poland,” he said.Victory for Trzaskowski would strengthen Poland’s status in the European Union and boost the government’s progressive agenda, particularly on LGBTQ and abortion rights.A win for Nawrocki, an admirer of US President Donald Trump, could make Poland a more awkward partner in Europe and may lead to fresh parliamentary elections.In the central town of Halinow, Agnieszka Lewinska, a 56-year-old cleaner, said she was voting for Trzaskowski.”He’s educated, speaks many languages, is intelligent,” she said.But Warsaw pensioner Lila Chojecka, 60, said she cast her ballot for Nawrocki.”Catholic values are important to me. I know he shares them,” she told AFP.- Divided Poland -Ewa Marciniak, a sociologist and director of the CBOS polling institute, said the exit poll result showed “how divided Poland is”.”The tiny difference between the two rivals opens the way to attempts to question the result. That is the last thing we need at this time of internal tensions and war in our neighbour” Ukraine, she said.The potential for a court challenge of the results has raised concerns in the pro-EU camp.Reforms by the country’s previous nationalist government, which installed loyalist judges, were harshly criticised by opponents and the EU as undermining the rule of law in Poland.Prime Minister Donald Tusk, a former European Council chief, said these elections “were particularly important”, speaking after he voted in the seaport of Sopot.The president in Poland, a fast-growing economy of 38 million people, has the power to veto legislation and is also the commander-in-chief of the armed forces.A victory for independent candidate Nawrocki would embolden the populist Law and Justice (PiS) party, which ruled Poland between 2015 and 2023.Many of his supporters want stricter curbs on immigration and advocate conservative social values and more sovereignty for the country within the European Union.- ‘Live in a free country’ -Poland, an EU and NATO member, has been a crucial diplomatic supporter of neighbouring Ukraine as it fights off Russia’s invasion.It is also a key supply route for Western arms and aid going into Ukraine. Victory for Nawrocki could complicate these ties as he opposes NATO membership for Ukraine and has spoken of toughening rules for the estimated one million Ukrainian refugees living in Poland.Anna Materska-Sosnowska, a political scientist at the University of Warsaw, called the election “a real clash of civilisations” because of the wide policy differences between the candidates.Many Trzaskowski voters back greater integration within the EU and an acceleration of social reforms.Trzaskowski supports introducing civil partnerships for same-sex couples and easing Poland’s near-total ban on abortion.Malgorzata Wojciechowska, a tour guide and teacher in her fifties, said Polish women “unfortunately do not have the same rights as our European friends”.”I hope that Rafal Trzaskowski will relaunch the debate on abortion so that we can finally live in a free country,” she told AFP.The government, which came to power in 2023, has been stymied in its reform efforts because of a deadlock with the current nationalist incumbent, President Andrzej Duda.
Sun, 01 Jun 2025 21:43:35 GMT
