• Interview.Mateusz Morawiecki: "The EU's problems are in sight: slowness and particularities"

The President of the European People's Party (PPE) and former President of the European Council, Donald Tusk, has called for a boycott of the presidential elections next May in Poland, which are held by mail, understanding that this method would be unconstitutional and unsafe.

"In my opinion we should not participate in the vote by mail," said Tusk, who said he did not deliberately use the term elections.

The Polish Government, dominated by the Law and Justice (PIS) party, has set the elections to the Head of State on May 10 and, given the exceptional situation arising from the coronavirus pandemic, proposes that they be held by mail. Opposition parties ask that they be postponed.

The recently enacted law by the Executive to allow universal voting by mail has not entered into force. Parliament is slated to discuss it on May 6, although approval is expected given that the PiS has a majority in the House. The strongest proof that the Government has this law is that preparations have already started for a vote to which some 33 million Poles will be called.

In a video message, Tusk, who before becoming president of the European Council held the post of prime minister in Poland, warned that, regardless of the doubts generated by this logistics, the constitutional requirements established for an election are not guaranteed. He quoted the secret of the vote.

"If all the honest and decent Poles say that this is not an election and we will not participate, the PiS will have to back down," suggested Tusk, who invited the government to listen to the criticism that this vote has generated in the population and in the class. politics and to seek an agreement with all political forces.

In a recent interview with this newspaper, the Polish Prime Minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, defended the holding of the elections on May 10, ensuring that voting by mail is standard practice and Poland has the necessary infrastructure for them to run properly.

Morawecki also rejected the opposition's argument that the government resist a postponement because the pro-government candidate, and current president, Andrzej Duda, is currently leading the polls.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

Know more

  • Poland
  • Coronavirus

CoronavirusThe Polish Government maintains the May presidential elections and studies that they be by mail

CultureAnne Applebaum: "I am sure that some governments will fall due to the coronavirus crisis"

IsraelRemembering Holocaust victims under threat of coronavirus