Wojciech Maksymowicz, an MP from Poland’s United Right (Zjednoczona Prawica) ruling coalition who until recently served as a deputy minister, has quit his party and joined centrist opposition group Poland 2050 (Polska 2050).
It is the first time that an MP from the governing camp has defected to Poland 2050, which was formed last year by independent presidential candidate Szymon Hołownia. It has subsequently risen in the polls to become the most popular opposition group.
Announcing his new allegiance today, Maksymowicz, who is a medical doctor, criticised the government’s recently announced healthcare policies. They are a “return to communist-era centralism” that will “lead to the collapse of the health service”, he warned, quoted by Polsat News.
Dość już starej opozycji zakopanej w swoich własnych koleinach światopoglądowych, podziałów, kast politycznych, które się wytworzyły – @szymon_holownia wita Wojciecha Maksymowicza w @PL_2050 https://t.co/QNDnhpVjZh
— PolsatNews.pl (@PolsatNewsPL) May 20, 2021
Speaking alongside Maksymowicz, Hołownia declared that he “strongly encourages everyone in the United Right camp who is still hesitating…to move to the side of people who really want the values with which you went into politics – solidarity, democracy, actually implementing law and justice”.
The latter words refer to the name of Law and Justice (PiS), the main party in the ruling coalition, which has recently seen growing tensions with its two junior partners. The opposition has also been consumed by internal struggles, and Poland 2050 has already succeeded in poaching lawmakers from centrist rival Civic Coalition (KO) and The Left (Lewica).
Maksymowicz had been a member of Agreement (Porozumienie), a centre-right party that is part of the United Right. Last November, he resigned as deputy minister for education and science in order to return to work as a doctor during the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic.
He remained an MP, but last month announced that he was quitting PiS’s parliamentary caucus. That decision came a day after the health ministry had announced it was looking into “irregularities” in Maksymowicz’s medical work, including possible “unethical experiments” on human foetuses. He has denied those allegations.
Last night, Maksymowicz confirmed that he was leaving the Agreement party, before today revealing his move to Poland 2050. In response to Maksymowicz’s announcement, a deputy leader of Agreement, Robert Anacki, also declared that he was quitting the party for unspecified reasons.
The two departures add to mounting problems for Agreement chairman and deputy prime minister Jarosław Gowin. He has seen his leadership challenged by a group of rebels, who this week confirmed they are seeking to form a new grouping within the ruling camp under a different name.
Zatem i ja dołączam. Chciałem podziękować Prezesowi @Jaroslaw_Gowin oraz wszystkim przyjaciołom za współpracę i życzyć powodzenia w walce o wolność w wymiarze osobistym i gospodarczym. Przede mną ogromne wyzwania w wymiarze osobistym – zdrowia, a także biznesowe.✌️ https://t.co/ciTOxJWHno
— Robert Anacki (@RobertAnacki) May 19, 2021
Poland 2050 becomes the latest in a series of different party affiliations for Maksymowicz, who previously served as health minister in 1997-99.
Before joining Agreement’s predecessor, Poland Together (Polska Razem), in 2013 he had, like Gowin, been affiliated with Civic Platform (PO), which ruled Poland from 2007-15 and is now the largest opposition party and the leading force in the Civic Coalition.
In recent months, Maksymowicz has become a critic of current health minister Adam Niedzielski’s response to the coronavirus pandemic. In March, amid record Covid deaths, he called it a “big failure” and said that the “system is not very well organised”.
An MP from Poland's ruling camp – who is also a medical doctor and former head of the National Health Fund (NFZ) – has criticised the health minister, saying the current Covid situation is a "big failure" by him and the "system is not very well organised" https://t.co/2ch9YycO1V
— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) March 24, 2021
On Saturday, the government unveiled a major policy programme, known as the “Polish Deal”, which includes reforms of and increased spending on the healthcare system, which has struggled during the pandemic.
The Polish Deal marked a display of unity between the three parties in the ruling coalition, which as well as PiS and Agreement includes the hard-right United Poland (Solidarna Polska). But tensions remain and rumours continue to suggest the possibility of early elections.
Recent weeks have also seen growing splits among the opposition. The Civic Coalition has fallen to its lowest ever support in polls, and its efforts to create a united front against PiS collapsed when The Left and other parties ignored its calls not to vote for the government’s ratification of the European Union’s coronavirus recovery fund.
Main image credit: Polsat (screenshot)
Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.
