The Polish opposition’s own goal

WARSAW — Over the past six months, Poland’s government coalition, comprising Law and Justice (PiS) and two tiny parties, had been decaying markedly, creating a golden opportunity for the opposition to oust it. But, instead of forming a united front, the opposition fell to infighting, and Poland’s PiS-led populist government could emerge stronger than ever.

A rivalry between Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and Minister of Justice Zbigniew Ziobro to succeed PiS Chairman Jarosław Kaczynski had incited a series of parliamentary crises. Deputies in each of the three government parties left, and relations within the coalition devolved into open animosity. PiS’s approval fell from over 40 per cent to around 30 per cent — only half the combined support for the opposition parties.

The crisis within PiS has been compounded by the pandemic. While the first global wave of COVID-19 largely bypassed Poland, the second and third waves have lifted the country to the top of international rankings. At around 1,900 per million inhabitants, Poland’s death rate now exceeds that of the United States, the United Kingdom, and Sweden.

And yet, when it came to the most important matter of this parliamentary term — ratifying the EU Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF), which allocates some 58 billion euros ($70.7 billion) to Poland — the government initially lacked a majority in the Sejm. Arguing that the RRF will undermine Polish sovereignty and usher in more EU federalism, an insurgent faction allied with Ziobro refused to vote for it. And Ziobro’s assault on judicial independence in Poland has put the government on a collision course with the European Union, which has responded with a new conditionality principle (“funds in return for compliance with the rule of law”).

The opposition’s position had been that the RRF should be ratified, but only in exchange for guarantees that the money will be spent fairly — a demand prompted by the manner in which PiS has distributed the Government Fund for Local Initiatives. A report by the Batory Foundation shows that ten times more money was channeled to PiS strongholds than allocated elsewhere, with most “opposition” municipalities receiving nothing. If the RRF money were to be distributed the same way, opposition support would amount to political self-sabotage.

But, complicating matters, the party grouping Lewica, which unites post-communists and young leftists, broke away from the opposition alliance because it had been secretly negotiating with the government. Apparently, PiS promised to allocate 30 per cent of funds to local governments (though it’s unclear which ones); build 75,000 housing units (though the reconstruction fund does not provide for this); and set up a monitoring committee that will include representatives of local governments, trade unions and NGOs (though without details about relative shares).

It is not clear why Lewica would trust a party that has not stuck to any of its agreements so far. And its actions make even less sense when one considers that its voters are more anti-PiS than those of the other opposition parties. It seems that Lewica was simply desperate to end its stagnation in the polls by attracting PiS voters.

After news of these machinations broke, PiS quickly recovered its bearings and brokered an agreement with its coalition partners that made Ziobro’s support unnecessary. The recovery fund was ratified on May 4, and a fratricidal war among the opposition ensued.

PiS then seized the initiative and started promoting what it calls a “Polish Deal”. Presented at a party convention on May 15, its plan combines additional social transfers with much more progressive taxation. As usual, the party is looking out primarily for its electoral base: poorer people and those living in the countryside. Around 18 million Poles will pay less in tax, and two-thirds of retirees will pay nothing.

Moreover, Polish families with two or more children will receive 2,700 euros, and young Poles hoping to buy an apartment will be eligible for loan guarantees. There will be more public spending on health care (reaching 6 per cent of GDP by 2023), and, according to Kaczynski, the government “will strive to abolish junk [labour] contracts... to create one mechanism, one model of employment”.

Finally, PiS has announced an ambitious investment programme, which will fund everything from sports fields to hospitals, as well as the reconstruction of historic buildings (like the Saxon Palace in Warsaw, which once served as the seat of Poland’s kings). The government should have no problem financing this programme, since it will soon have an additional 58 billion euros from the EU at its disposal.

PiS’s Polish Deal does not augur well for Lewica or Civic Platform, the main opposition party. Both have already begun to fragment internally and suffer in the polls — with Civic Platform falling towards 10 per cent support while Lewica sits at 6 per cent. The biggest beneficiaries of the opposition’s problems are PiS, of course, as well as a new party led by the TV personality Szymon Hołownia (20 per cent), who skillfully avoids entering into any disputes or alienating anyone.

Rafał Trzaskowski, Warsaw’s liberal mayor, is getting more active in central politics. For now, he has taken up the Campus Europa initiative, a summer school for 1000 young people that may prove to be a source of human capital for any new political movement. Otherwise, the opposition lacks a leader who can match Kaczynski. Former prime minister Donald Tusk once played that role as Civic Platform’s leader. But he now heads the European People’s Party, the umbrella group of centre-right parties in the European Parliament, and can only watch from afar as his party snatches defeat from the jaws of victory.

Sławomir Sierakowski, founder of the Krytyka Polityczna movement, is director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Warsaw and senior fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations. ©Project Syndicate, 2019. 

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