US embassy cable - 05WARSAW2912

C O N F I D E N T I A L  WARSAW 002912 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/21/2015 
TAGS: PGOV, PREL, PL, Polish Elections 
SUBJECT: ELECTION SEASON IN FULL SWING WITH PARLIAMENTARY 
LISTS AND PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATES CHOSEN 
 
 
Classified By: Charge d'Affaires, A.I., Mary Curtin for Reasons 1.5(B) 
and (D) 
 
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Summary 
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1.  (C) With just over two months until parliamentary 
elections and just under three months until the first round 
of presidential elections, the election season in Poland is 
in full swing.  The presidential race is still fluid. 
Parliamentary speaker Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz, who entered 
the race several weeks ago, has surged into first place in 
most polls, with conventional wisdom now being that he will 
face center-right Law and Justice (PiS) leader Lech Kaczynski 
in the final round.  Opinion polls on the parliamentary 
elections have been less volatile, but presumed future 
coalition partners, centrist Civic Platform (PO) and PiS have 
switched places, with PiS now generally seen as in the lead, 
which would affect the make-up of a coalition government and 
impact the presidential race.  In the meantime, the currently 
governing Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) continues its public 
infighting, with the old guard being shoved off Sejm 
electoral lists and into the less powerful Senate.  Parties 
farther out on the political spectrum, including populist 
Self-Defense (SO) and Catholic nationalist League of Polish 
Families (LPR) will likely run ahead of their polling 
numbers, but not participate in any government.  Several 
other parties may not meet the five percent threshold to be 
seated in parliament.  End Summary. 
 
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Cimoszewicz the New 
Presidential Front-runner 
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2.  (SBU) The entry of Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz into the very 
fluid presidential race as the principal candidate of the 
left has once again created a new front-runner.  Cimoszewicz 
shot to first place in recent opinion polls, ahead of 
center-right PiS candidate, Lech Kaczynski, and non-partisan 
candidate Zbigniew Religa, who led some surveys just a month 
ago.  Two surveys published July 19 show Cimoszewicz winning 
30 and 31 percent of the vote in the first round of 
elections, with Kaczynski scoring 20 and 25 percent, and 
Religa dropping behind populist Andrzej Lepper.  However, the 
two new surveys differ on which of the two would win the 
second round, with one poll showing Cimoszewicz winning 58 
percent of the vote if matched with Kaczynski, and another 
showing them in a dead heat.  Populist Andrzej Lepper, PO's 
Donald Tusk, and Religa are variously shown as having 10 to 
15 percent support.  The rest of the candidates (there are 
now some nine candidates announced, although not all have 
officially filed) fall below ten percent. 
 
3.  (C)  Cimoszewicz, who originally announced he would not 
run for president, told Ambassador he was joining the race in 
order to stop Kaczynski, who enjoyed a lead in late spring 
and early summer.  Support for Kaczynski has kept him 
steadily in first or second place in most polls for several 
months, but his rise in popularity also sparked a 
counter-reaction of support for candidates seen as able to 
stop him.  Before Cimoszewicz announced his candidacy, 
Religa, a heart surgeon with no clear platform, peaked with 
25 percent support in one opinion poll, dropping to 14 
percent in today's survey.  It is hard to predict whether or 
not support for Cimoszewicz will hold.  He has enjoyed a 
bounce despite (or perhaps because of) the fact that he 
stormed out of an July 9 Sejm investigatory commission 
hearing, criticizing the commission's members and purpose. 
There are a significant number of Poles with left and 
center-left political identification who are looking for a 
candidate to support, even if they have lost faith in the 
SLD.  This could provide Cimoszewicz  -- as a credible 
"anti-Kaczynski" -- with sustained support. 
 
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PiS Moves Ahead in 
Parliamentary Race 
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4.  (SBU) The parliamentary race has been less volatile, with 
the greatest shift in recent months being center-right PiS's 
gradual trend toward first place, and centrist PO's 
concomitant slide into second place, changing presumptions 
about the balance of power and division of spoils in a future 
coalition government.  Most polls have for some time shown 
that PiS and PO will be the top two vote (and seat) getters, 
and together should win enough votes to form a coalition 
government.  Until recent months, however, poll results 
showed that PO would win more votes and seats, and common 
wisdom was that PO leader Jan Rokita would become Prime 
Minister, with something of a presumption that Lech Kaczynski 
would win the presidency, providing a neat balance for the 
 
 
two parties.  In recent months, PiS has steadily moved ahead 
of PO in most polls.  While both PiS and PO leaders 
consistently say that they expect to form a coalition, they 
have been more sharply battling each other for the top 
position, with PO leaders, in particular, attacking PiS's 
more statist economic platform and plans for constitutional 
and governmental reforms. 
 
5.  (SBU) A PiS lead could pose some problems for both 
parties.  It would be hard for Rokita, who has been playing 
the role of presumptive Prime Minister for some time, to 
accept a lesser position if PO ends up in second place.  On 
policy matters, he has stated publicly and privately that PO 
will insist upon its liberal economic agenda, including a 
flat tax, as a condition of coalition, but he will have a 
hard time doing that if PiS holds the winning hand and ends 
up with the Prime Minister's office and other leading 
domestic ministries.  A PiS win could also be problematic for 
PiS itself, and for Lech Kaczynski's presidential bid in 
particular.  His twin brother, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, is the 
party's parliamentary leader, and would be the only obvious 
PiS choice for Prime Minister, but there is considerable 
discomfort with the thought of the identical twins running 
the country.  Even the Kaczynski's have ruled out such a 
scenario.  Some have suggested that Rokita would be prime 
minister no matter which party holds more seats. 
Nonetheless, many commentators think that if PiS has a strong 
showing in the parliamentary race, voters will balance that 
out with a vote for another candidate, such as Cimoszewicz, 
when they return to the polls two weeks later for the first 
round of the presidential election. 
 
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SLD Infighting Continues 
------------------------ 
 
6. (SBU) In the meantime, the SLD continues to struggle with 
internal battles and support in the polls hovering around 10 
percent despite Cimoszewicz's popularity bounce.  The SLD 
National Council came out of a seven-hour meeting over the 
weekend with the announcement that several of the party's 
hard-line old guard, including former Prime Minister Leszek 
Miller, former Sejm Marshal and party chief Jozef Oleksy, as 
well as Marek Dyduch and Jerzy Jaskierna would not be on 
SLD's parliamentary election lists, and instead would have to 
run for the less powerful Senate.  (Miller has already said 
he would not run.)  There is considerable speculation over 
who holds the real power in the SLD, with most people 
assuming it is not the 31-year old leader, Wojciech 
Olejniczak, who was elected to head the party in May.  Other 
party stalwarts, including Defense Minister Jerzy 
Szmajdzinski, Interior Minister Richard Kalisz, SLD 
Parliamentary club leader Krzysztof Janik, and Sejm Deputy 
Katarzyna Piekarska, are all parliamentary list leaders in 
their constituencies.  Several commentators, including a 
public TV program July 19 report, say that the old guard are 
complaining that President Kwasniewski, who has undertaken 
several efforts to rejuvenate and reform the SLD's image, is 
behind Olejniczak's push to exile Oleksy, Miller and the 
others.  Olejniczak, of course, asserts that he is the real 
leader.  The SLD can count on a minimum level of support from 
die-hard members who benefited from the socialist system, but 
it seems there is little it can do to significantly improve 
its electoral chances in this election, and SLD leaders 
seemed resigned to simply holding on so they can position 
themselves for the future. 
 
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Other Parties Position 
Themselves for Parliamentary 
Roles, but Some Will Lose Out 
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7.  (C)  Farther out along the political spectrum, both 
Andrzej Lepper's Self Defense (SO) and the Catholic 
nationalist LPR seem likely each to win a block of voters in 
the 10-15 percent range, but are not expected to join any 
government.  LPR, according to most observers, has a solid 
group of supporters, and some splintering in the party and 
differences with the influential Catholic "Radio Maryja" do 
not seem to have hurt it much.  LPR may end up with a 
somewhat better showing on election day than polls indicate 
because LPR voters turn out in higher percentages than the 
overall population.  (However, LPR's presidential candidate, 
Maciej Giertych, father of its parliamentary leader, Roman 
Giertych, ranks consistently very low in the polls.)  And, 
despite some earlier speculations that PiS might look to the 
Catholic nationalist League of Polish Families (LPR) for 
support if PO and PiS do not hold a solid parliamentary 
majority, it is now clear from public and private statements 
that the fundamental differences between the parties are 
quite sharp, even though they appeal to some of the same 
voters.  In a meeting with Ambassador, PiS parliamentary 
leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski harshly criticized the world view 
 
 
of LPR leader Roman Giertych, especially his 
ultra-nationalist views.  Roman Giertych has said, however, 
that LPR might cast a vote of confidence in favor of a 
presumed PO-PiS coalition. 
 
8.  (SBU)  Lepper and his party could also perform better 
than expected.  Some political observers predict that 
disgruntled former SLD supporters will cast their vote for SO 
and Lepper, attracted by Lepper's populist rhetoric.  Several 
observers have told us that they think that there are a 
significant number of people who will vote for SO candidates 
or for Lepper in the privacy of the ballot box, but do not 
want to admit this to a pollster, meaning he and his party 
could do better than polls are predicting.  But all polls 
show that Lepper would be soundly defeated in any match up 
should he somehow make it to the second round of the 
presidential election. 
 
9.  (SBU)  Several other parties across the spectrum are 
hovering so close to the five percent mark that they may not, 
in the end, win enough votes to be seated in the Sejm.  The 
evolution of the post-Solidarity Freedom Union (UW) party 
into the new Democratic Party (PD), and the splash caused by 
its recruitment of several high profile SLD members, 
including former economy minister Jerzy Hausner, has not 
helped it at all in the opinion polls, and PD may not win any 
seats.  Other parties in a similar position include Social 
Democracy Poland (SDPL -- which broke away from SLD in 2004 
over corruption), the Peasants Party (PSL -- Poland's oldest 
political party and a former partner of SLD in the current 
government), the Union of Labor (UP -- another SLD partner), 
and the Greens (which currently hold no parliamentary seats). 
 
 
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Comment 
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10.  (SBU)  While filing deadlines are not until next month 
(August 16 for presidential candidates and August 25 for 
parliamentary candidates), the outlines of the election are 
now clear, and the campaigns fully under way.  This is the 
first time parliamentary and presidential elections have been 
held in such close proximity, and so it is hard to speculate 
on the impact of each election on the other.  In addition, 
opinion polls about support for various parties are done on a 
nationwide basis, whereas the proportional division of the 
parliamentary seats will be done at the level of the 
electoral district, meaning there could be some significant 
differences between the relative position of parties in the 
polls and the number of Sejm seats they end up winning.  End 
Comment. 
CURTIN