Tusk to face ‘tougher’ co-existence with another PiS president

If PiS fails to obtain a vote of confidence and Donald Tusk returns to power as prime minister, he will have to work alongside PiS President Andrzej Duda, which may leave him with déjà vu as he worked alongside previous PiS President Lech Kaczyński during his first term as prime minister in 2007.

With his decision to appoint the ruling PiS’ nominee Mateusz Morawiecki as prime minister, Duda showed he does not intend to give up his loyalty to his own political camp, despite the three opposition blocs, which declared their readiness to form a government, having bigger chances of securing a parliamentary majority.

Still, as last month’s general elections left PiS with 194 seats in the Sejm, the parliament’s lower house, compared to 248 seats taken by the opposition, PiS will likely fail to obtain a vote of confidence and it will eventually be Tusk’s camp that forms a government.

However, such a scenario means Tusk must manage his relations with the president from the opposite political camp, which may leave him with déjà vu.

Tusk’s Civic Platform (PO) and PiS have been Poland’s main opposing political forces for years. During Tusk’s first term as prime minister, starting from 2007, he found it hard to come to terms with another PiS president, Lech Kaczyński, the twin brother of PiS leader Jarosław, until his tragic death in a plane catastrophe in April 2010.

Tusk used to clash with Kaczyński on many issues, including who should represent Poland in the European Council: the prime minister, as it has always been the case or the president.

With the story repeating, this term will not prove easier for the former European Council president and current opposition leader.

Much has changed since 2010

“It could be much worse now,” Jarosław Flis, Professor of Social Studies at Jagiellonian University in Krakow, told Euractiv Poland.

He referred to the multitude of controversial reforms that PiS introduced during its eight-year rule, including in the judicial system, public media, and reproductive rights, which the opposition believes seriously undermined Polish democracy.

“Things have gone too far, with the law violations being too serious,” Flis believes, pointing to the public media as one example, which the critics say has become the source of the government’s propaganda in recent years.

Back then, before 2015, the public media were not as hostile towards the opposition as they are now, and the Constitutional Tribunal was not an extension of the parliamentary majority, the expert said.

Since PiS came to power in 2015 and began to introduce changes in the judiciary, the Constitutional Tribunal, which both the Polish opposition and Brussels accuse of being politicised, took numerous contentious decisions that favoured the ruling camp, including contesting the primacy of the EU law over national law system and further restricting the abortion law.

Tusk and his camp pledged to reverse PiS’s most controversial legal changes and restore the rule of law in the country. Still, Flis believes Duda may block the process.

His most potent weapon is a veto right, which he may use on laws he does not like.

Respecting the nation’s will

On the relations between Duda and the Tusk-led government, “much will depend on the president,” Dariusz Joński, a lawmaker of centre-left Polish Initiative, a grouping allied with PO, told Euractiv Poland.

“Tusk is a world-class politician who would return to representing the parliamentary majority. The president may obstruct his efforts, but this is not something that the Polish people would like,” he said.

For the sake of his own good image, Duda, even if he does not respect other politicians, must respect the nation’s will, Joński believes.

“I hope this is what he would start to do once PiS and Kaczyński lose power,” he concluded.

Neither PiS MEP Ryszard Legutko believes in good cooperation between Duda and the government of the current opposition, but unlike Joński, he blames Tusk for that.

For years, Tusk has shown “contempt, brutality and rudeness” towards both the president and the PiS government, Legutko told Euractiv Poland.

“I do not have a good opinion about Donald Tusk’s political culture,” he said, referring to PO’s last election campaign as “an incredible display of rudeness” towards the party’s political opponents and the president himself.

“There are already signals” that such an approach by Tusk to Duda will continue, he added.

The president’s future

Unlike Lech Kaczyński, to whom he lost the presidency in 2005, Tusk has never directly competed with Duda in the elections.

Before 2010, the cold war with Tusk did not come to Lech Kaczyński’s benefit and his chances for re-election, Flis says. The older of the twin brothers has never had a chance to run for a second term, though, as he died in a plane crash the year when the elections were scheduled.

Things look different with Duda, who has served as president since 2015 and has already exhausted his right to be re-elected once. Consequently, he would instead focus on securing his political future after the end of his presidency in 2025. This is one of the reasons why Duda remains loyal to PiS, Flis and Joński agree.

The president may want to replace Jarosław Kaczyński as PiS head, Joński said, adding that it would not be an easy task, given he has strong competition for that position. His potential rivals include Morawiecki and Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro. Consequently, Duda must prove he is the best candidate, the lawmaker believes.

Duda may also count for being nominated for prime minister in a future PiS government, Flis said. However, this will depend on the results of the next general elections, scheduled for 2027.

(Aleksandra Krzysztoszek | Euractiv.pl)