Poles began voting for a new president yesterday in a race led by two politicians rooted in the anti-communist Solidarity movement, underlining the decline of the country's former communists.
The two leading contenders, Donald Tusk and Lech Kaczynski, grew to political maturity as activists with Lech Walesa's Solidarity movement in the 1980s and have campaigned on promises to fight corruption and the influence of ex-communists in institutions such as the army and intelligence services.
But the two also present different visions for Poland. Tusk is a strongly pro-business lawmaker who wants low taxes, deregulation and a limited role for the state in the economy. Kaczynski, the mayor of Warsaw, advocates a strong role for the state in fighting the country's 18 percent jobless rate and in preserving many welfare benefits for citizens.
With polls showing them as the only two with a shot at victory from among 12 contenders, the outcome is set to further reinforce the stinging defeat already dealt to the governing former communists in Sept. 25 parliamentary elections.
Some 30 million people are registered to vote in the elections. Polls opened at 4am at 25,000 polling stations across the country and they will remain open until 6pm. Partial results were expected by late evening.
The winner of the presidential race will replace Aleksander Kwasniewski, himself a former communist whose second and final five-year term is coming to a close. Although Kwasniewski has been popular, even dubbed the Polish Bill Clinton for his easygoing style, the left has self-destructed in past years amid a string of corruption scandals.
The parties of the front-runners -- Tusk's Civic Platform and Kaczynski's Law and Justice -- ran away with the parliamentary ballot and are already in coalition talks to form a new right-leaning government. Observers says that a Tusk victory would strengthen the hand of his party, which came second in parliamentary elections, as the two victors struggle to agree on a joint program and who gets what Cabinet seat. A Tusk win would also calm foreign investors, who fear that Law and Justice's welfare policies will slow reforms in the EU's largest new member.
Though opinion polls before the presidential election gave an advantage to Tusk, his lead was narrowing and neither seemed on course for a knockout victory in the first round. If no candidate wins more than 50 percent of the votes, a runoff between the two top contenders will be held two weeks later. Image-wise, the top contenders also differ. Tusk is slim, youthful-looking, a 48-year-old historian with a mild manner that makes him a favorite among centrist voters.
Kaczynski by contrast is a stout, 56-year-old lawyer with a combative style who has used his mayor's office for tough talk against Russia and Germany. That stance has given him the reputation of a straight-talker and has won him respect from Poles still bitter over the German and Soviet invasions of Poland during World War II, and Moscow's dominance over Poland through the Cold War.
Kaczynski has also captured headlines this year by trying to stop a gay pride parade through Warsaw.
Przemyslaw Kulesza, a 21-year-old student majoring in sports, said he wasn't crazy about either candidate but planned to choose Tusk because he seems like "the lesser evil."
"In my opinion, Kaczynski is homophobic. Because of this I don't like him," Kulesza said.
But Maciej Chrzanowski, who is studying philosophy, said he would support Kaczynski because of his party's promises to preserve tuition-free university education and other help for the less well-off.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese