Polish opposition picks non-party candidate for presidential election

Nov 24, 2024 | History, Politics

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Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and is published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

Poland’s main opposition party, the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS), has named Karol Nawrocki as its candidate for next year’s presidential election.

In an unusual move, they have chosen a figure who is not a member of the party. Nawrocki is the head of the Institute of National Remembrance (IPN), a state historical body, a position to which he was appointed under the former PiS government in 2021.

Today’s announcement follows yesterday’s nomination of Warsaw mayor Rafał Trzaskowski as the candidate of the centrist Civic Coalition (KO), Poland’s main ruling group. He and Nawrocki will now be the two main rivals to succeed PiS-aligned incumbent Andrzej Duda when his term as president ends next year.

 

Nawrocki’s nomination was confirmed at a meeting in the historical Sokół sports hall in Kraków – the same venue where, ten years ago, Duda – then a relatively little-known figure, like Nawrocki now – was named as PiS’s candidate for the presidency.

PiS leader Jarosław Kaczyński admitted that they had chosen “a candidate whom many of our activists, including those at the very top, did not know closely”.

He explained that the reason for the unusual choice was not only Nawrocki’s “excellent personal qualities” but “also the fact that we unfortunately have a situation that can be described as an internal war” in Poland.

“We do not want this war; Poles do not want this war. Therefore, we need a credible person, independent of any political group, who will have the will and the ability to end this war. Not in the name of the interest of any party, but in the name of the interest of Poland,” added Kaczyński.

 

Nawrocki then arrived on stage accompanied by the famous theme tune from the film Rocky – a reference to the fact that Nawrocki is a keen amateur boxer.

In his speech, the candidate declared that he would seek to “represent all Poles”. He also sought to emphasise his humble background, at one stage saying hello to his mother, who he said was probably “watching on TV in the same apartment where I grew up”.

“I know Poles, and I understand your needs. I am one of you. I have been with you all my life, alongside you,” said Nawrocki. “I want to become president because I know and understand that Poland must be great.”

Nawrocki also declared that “we cannot be ashamed” of Christian values and, in a dig at Trzaskowski, said that “we cannot remove crosses from Polish offices”. Earlier this year, the mayor of Warsaw caused controversy by ordering the removal of religious symbols from city hall.

Media reports have suggested that Kaczyński hopes to repeat the trick of a decade ago by nominating a relatively little-known figure rather than a big name.

When Duda was chosen in November 2014, he was a rank outsider for the presidency, long trailing incumbent Bronisław Komorowski in the polls. However, he gradually built momentum and secured victory in 2015, before being re-elected in 2020 for a second and constitutionally final term.

However, in 2014, Duda was already relatively experienced in politics, having worked in the justice ministry and presidential chancellery of Lech Kaczyński before being elected first as a member of Poland’s parliament and then the European Parliament.

Nawrocki, by contrast, has never served in elected office, nor reportedly even been a member of a political party.

After obtaining a doctorate in history, Nawrocki worked for the IPN before being appointed as head of the Museum of the Second World War in Gdańsk – his home city – after his predecessor was controversially pushed out by the then PiS government.

He served there from 2017 to 2021 before being chosen by parliament, where PiS had a majority, as the new head of the IPN, a body tasked with not only documenting and promoting Poland’s twentieth-century history, but also prosecuting those responsible for Nazi-German and communist-era crimes.

In both of his roles, Nawrocki played a prominent part in the PiS’s government’s “historical policy”, which was aimed at promoting patriotic narratives of the past as well as dealing with what the party claimed was the lingering legacy of the communist era.

As head of the IPN, he, above all, became associated with a push to implement a PiS-era law requiring the “decommunisation” of public spaces by removing objects and names that “propagate communism or other totalitarian systems”.

In particular, since the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Nawrocki has overseen the demolition of dozens of Soviet-era monuments that remained in Poland after the fall of communism in 1989.

Those actions have been strongly criticised by Moscow, which claims they violate an agreement between Poland and Russia. Nawrocki has even found himself included on a list of those wanted by the Russian authorities.

The first round of the presidential elections will take place in May. As well as Trzaskowski and Nawrocki, the two other main candidates to be declared so far are Sławomir Mentzen of the far-right Confederation (Konfederacja) and Szymon Hołownia of the centrist Poland 2050 (Polska 2050).

Though Poland’s president has little influence in formulating policy or legislation, they can veto bills passed by parliament. That power has been used by Duda to stymie the agenda of the more liberal government that replaced PiS in office last December.


Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

Main image credit: Jakub Wlodek / Agencja Wyborcza.pl

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