Warsaw course: how the victory of Andrzej Duda in the elections will affect the politics of Poland

The current president of Poland Andrzej Duda won the second round of elections and will lead the country for another term. The politician representing the ruling national conservative party, Law and Justice (PiS), won 51.03% of the vote. Such data were provided by the National Electoral Commission, having counted 100% of the ballots.

Opponent Dudy, a representative of the opposition centrist party Civic Platform, Rafal Tshaskovsky, lost by a margin. Elections took place at a turnout of 68.12%, which was the highest rate of voter turnout over the past thirty years.

Recall that the second round of the presidential election was appointed in Poland after the first, Andrzej Duda and Rafal Tzaskowski won 43.5 and 30.46% of the vote, respectively.

“A miracle did not happen”

In his campaign, Andrzej Duda emphasized measures of state support for the population, promising to maintain and increase social programs for Polish families. The politician also promised that the retirement age in the country would not be increased, and pensioners over 75 years old would be provided with free medicines. In addition, Duda promised to take care of young mothers, providing them with comfortable working conditions. As stated in the policy program, motherhood should not be an obstacle to a woman's professional career.

A separate block of campaign promises of Andrzej Duda was devoted to the protection of conservative values. So, marriage should be exclusively a union of a woman and a man, and the ideology of the LGBT movement should not penetrate state institutions. At the same time, parents should have the right to decide on their own how to raise their children, the program says.

• Rafal Tzaskowski
• Reuters
• © Aleksandra Szmigiel

An opponent of Andrzej Duda, the mayor of Warsaw, Rafal Tzaskowski, previously introduced the so-called LGBT Card in the Polish capital. The project provides, inter alia, for conducting anti-discrimination and sex education lessons in schools. However, during the presidential campaign, the politician said that he did not plan to extend this experience to the whole country if he won.

At the same time, Tshaskovsky promised to fight for improving the environmental situation in the country and introduce special environmental subsidies for the population, as well as attract investment in the economy. To this end, he promised to create a special fund, partially funded by the European Union. The politician also intended, in case of his victory, to abolish taxes on the income of citizens receiving less than 30 thousand zlotys per year (about $ 7600) and restore the rule of law and the independence of the judiciary.

In foreign policy, Andrzej Duda’s rival intended to restore Poland’s spoiled image in recent years and pursue a “wise” course. Tshaskowski promised to create conditions for dialogue with Germany, as well as with France and other European allies of Warsaw. A separate point of the program is devoted to relations with Russia: in the "Civil Platform" they recall that the Poles and Russians have always lived next to each other.

“Poland and Russia have learned to live together, but without each other. Poles and Russians have always been close to each other. As president, I will declare that I am always open to negotiations on how to improve our relations with Russia. After all, two such great nations are capable of more than remaining in an endless dead end, ”the program says.

According to experts, the fact that the candidates scored an almost equal number of votes in the second round speaks of a deep value split in Polish society.

“This is a confrontation in the field of universal, social and foreign policy values. Moreover, the poorer eastern part of the country, which used to be part of the Russian and Austrian empires, voted mainly for Duda, and the more prosperous western Poland voted for Tshaskowski, ”the lecturer at the Department of Foreign Regional Studies and Foreign Policy of the Historical and Archival explained in an interview with RT. Institute of Russian State Humanitarian University Vadim Trukhachev.

Moreover, the election results did not become a political triumph for the Law and Justice party, although its candidate retained the presidency.

PiS did not strengthen its power, but merely retained it. Yes, the miracle that the opposition had hoped for did not happen, but Duda’s popularity has also sank very much since May this year, when he was predicted a landslide victory, ”political analyst Stanislav Kuvaldin said in an interview with RT.

Confrontational position

The victory of Andrzej Duda in the elections may become a prologue to further deterioration of relations between Warsaw and Brussels. Such concerns are voiced in the media of Germany. According to the German publication Handelsblatt, during the election campaign, the representative of the ruling party, Andrzej Duda, actively exploited anti-German sentiments, and also tried to win the sympathy of outright right-wing radicals and Eurosceptics.

As another German media outlet, Die Welt, previously predicted, the victory of Andrzej Duda in the election could mean a further degradation of relations between Warsaw and Brussels. The fact is that during the election campaign, the incumbent president was flirting with the Confederation party, whose goal is Poland’s exit from the EU.

• Protests against judicial reform in Poland
• Reuters
• © Agencja Gazeta / Dawid Zuchowicz

However, the cooling in Polish-European relations began long before the 2020 election campaign. So, in November 2018, the President of the European Union (then Donald Tusk held this post) warned that the Polish authorities could provoke the country's exit from the EU without even wanting to.

The statement came amid serious disagreements between Warsaw and Brussels over the ongoing judicial reform by the Polish conservatives. Recall that the earlier ruling party in Poland, Law and Justice, adopted a number of amendments affecting the work of the courts. Due to the refusal of President Andrzej Duda to swear five judges of the Constitutional Court, who were elected by the previous composition of the Polish Sejm, a constitutional crisis erupted in the country earlier.

In the European Union, the actions of the ruling party in Poland were considered an attempt on the independence of the judicial branch, Brussels even threatened Warsaw with sanctions.

For its part, Warsaw is increasingly allowing direct attacks against Berlin. For example, last September, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Moravecki demanded that Germany compensate for the damage caused to Poland during World War II.

In addition, Warsaw is now preparing to host part of the US military contingent, which the Pentagon intends to withdraw from Germany. US President Donald Trump announced plans to redeploy some of the troops from Germany to Poland. The head of the White House also emphasized that Poland is one of the few countries fulfilling its budgetary obligations within the framework of NATO. 

At the same time, the redeployment of the American military contingent to Poland can increase military-political tension on the western borders of Russia.

As the press secretary of the Russian president Dmitry Peskov noted earlier, Poland alone can hardly be a threat to Russia. However, Poland’s willingness to provide its territory to host the military infrastructure of third countries, as well as NATO, may already threaten Russia.

“This is unpleasant for us, and most importantly, that it forces us to take the measures necessary to guarantee the security of our country,” Peskov added. 

Moreover, in the new National Security Strategy of the Republic of Poland, the “neo-imperial policy” of Russia pursued “with the help of military force” is called as the main threat.

According to Stanislav Kuvaldin, the outcome of the presidential election in Poland will have little effect on the situation in Russian-Polish relations.

“By and large, in Poland there are no parties seriously advocating forging relations with Russia, despite separate statements. Relations, of course, will not improve, but will not worsen, ”the expert said.

• US military
• Reuters
• © Cezary Aszkielowicz / Agencja Gazeta

The previous EU policy will continue, because Warsaw is interested in receiving European subsidies, Kuvaldin added.

“Poland will continue to be an indignant European calm, the tensions in relations with the EU will continue, but the Polish authorities are not very worried about this. Warsaw wants to develop closer relations with the USA, this is its goal, ”the expert added.

A similar point of view is shared by Vadim Trukhachev.

“It is unlikely that Poland will leave the EU, although the deterioration of relations will continue. In fact, when assessing the situation, one must take into account that Poland considers itself a great power and intends to assert its leadership in the region with the help of the USA. However, it is not a fact that Poland will eventually become a regional power - it does not have the necessary forces for this, ”the expert summed up.