Four groups on Poland’s left have signed an agreement to stand jointly at this autumn’s parliamentary elections, where they and other opposition parties will be seeking to prevent the ruling national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party from winning an unprecedented third term.
The four entities who have agreed to create a joint list of candidates are: New Left (Nowa Lewica), which was in 2021 itself formed from a merger of the Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) and Spring (Wiosna); Together (Razem); the Polish Socialist Party (PPS); and Labour Union (Unia Pracy).
The groups have already been involved in various forms of cooperation since 2019. Recent polling gives the united left support of around 8%, down from the 12.5% of the vote it won at the last parliamentary elections, where it finished third.
Monthly polling average for Poland’s main political groups (source: ewybory.eu)
Recent months have seen continued speculation over what form the opposition will stand in at this year’s elections. The largest opposition party, Civic Platform (PO), and its leader Donald Tusk have been strongly pushing for a joint list of all parties from left to centre-right.
However, that has been met with scepticism from other parties, and last week a senior PO figure, Grzegorz Schetyna, admitted that the most probable outcome was that the opposition would stand as three main blocs. It is likely that the left will be one of those.
“Without a strong left, we will not defeat PiS,” said Wojciech Konieczny, leader of PPS, at yesterday’s announcement of the joint list.
“The left is a guarantee that, after the elections, the future, democratic Poland will be pro-social, it will be a Poland where we will not forget about those who are weaker, where a roof over your head will be the right of every human being,” added Adrian Zandberg, one of the leaders of Together.
The Left, Poland's second largest opposition group, has set out its 10 policy priorities, including the right to abortion, climate neutrality, secular schools, affordable housing and marriage equalityhttps://t.co/SKOAlElGe7
— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) February 22, 2021
The four groups who signed the agreement yesterday noted that they still want more organisations to join them. Trade unions, feminist groups, urban activists and others are welcome, said Włodzimierz Czarzasty, a leader of the New Left.
Czarzasty also confirmed to RMF FM that an agreement is soon expected with other opposition parties over an electoral pact for the elections to the Senate, the upper house of parliament, where seats are decided as single-member districts unlike in the lower-house Sejm, where proportional representation is used.
At the last parliamentary elections in 2019, opposition groups stood separately for the Sejm but they created an electoral pact not to stand candidates against one another for the Senate, which allowed them to take control of the chamber from PiS.
With polls indicating the ruling party could be unseated at next year's elections, some have called for the opposition to stand as a single alliance.
The left, however, is resisting calls to unite – at least until after the election, writes @RBroszkowski https://t.co/pGhDkdODnR
— Notes from Poland 🇵🇱 (@notesfrompoland) November 14, 2022
Main image credit: Klub Lewicy/Flickr (under public domain)
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.
