Poland "needs to be repaired" after eight years of populist government that are expected to come to an end after pro-EU opposition parties won Sunday's elections, analysts said.
The ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party won 194 seats in the 460-seat parliament compared to 248 for three opposition parties that are likely to form a governing coalition.
With a record turnout for the post-Communist era of 74.38 percent, the vote was "a real feast for democracy", said political analyst Jaroslaw Kuisz.
But he warned that any new government faces a "minefield" as it embarks on changes the country needs.
Lukasz Bernatowicz, an expert with the Polish employers' group BCC, agreed that "the number of problems to resolve is enormous".
For many experts, reforming public media is a priority as state television and radio have become government mouthpieces.
"There cannot be, in a democratic country, public television financed by all of us that does not stop lying," Bernatowicz said.
Ewa Marciniak from the University of Warsaw said that "Poland needs to be repaired mainly in institutional, functional terms."
She said that while "many institutions have retained their competency but have ceased to function in the correct way" because of their management by government appointees.
Among these institutions, experts listed the Constitutional Court, the Supreme Court, the Prosecutor's Office but also the central bank or the management agency for waterways and forests.
Polish Border Guards Detain Russian Deserter
- 'Everything can explode' -
Kuisz said restoring rule of law -- a campaign promise of liberal opposition leader Donald Tusk -- will be particularly "perilous".
"Everything can explode at any moment," he said.
Controversial judicial reforms have been at the heart of a years-long dispute with the EU which has blocked billions of euros in funds.
President Andrzej Duda, a PiS ally whose term runs out in two years, was a supporter of the reforms.
The president holds veto powers that the new parliament cannot overturn and he could block "any new reform proposal", Kuisz said.
Nevertheless, the prospect of better ties with the EU helped explain a bounce in financial markets after the election, with the Polish zloty rising on currency exchange and stocks jumping.
Releasing blocked EU funds "is a priority for the economy" which is currently stuck in a sluggish phase, Bernatowicz said.
Inflation is high at a predicted 11.4 percent for 2023 while growth for the year is forecast at 0.5 percent.
With a decreasing birth-rate "we should open up to immigration but it has to be done in an intelligent way," Bernatowicz said.
There is also the major challenge of moving Poland away from its dependence on fossil fuels and towards renewables.
The opposition is hoping it can count on greater national consensus as it moves forward with promised reforms.
"We have to re-learn how to work together," Marciniak said.
But anyone hoping for some respite from the country's bitterly divisive political scene "will be disappointed". In parliament, she said, "things are still likely to get very heated".
You can also highlight the text and press Ctrl + Enter
Comments ( 1)
I.
The Total Opposition won the elections, even though the Law and Justice won the elections as a party.
The Total Opposition won only because all parties, hungry for power and wanting to get to the political "trough" as quickly as possible, merged against L&J.
The Total Opposition covers almost the entire political spectrum. There are right-wing and liberal-free-market voices, up to the classic Marxist left and the new, extreme LGBT left.
The question remains how this power and money hungry diverse entity will rule and for how long?
The opposition (as the Civic Platform) had already been in power in Poland for eight years, and left behind an economy in a poor condition, strained by corruption, taken over by foreign capital, unemployment and poverty.
In its foreign policy, the Civic Platform opposition persuaded the political aspirations of Germany and Russia.
@trifleas,
II.
Young people, who were given completely different life opportunities by the extremely anti-Russian Law and Justice party, do not remember those years very well.
Generally, young people are very influential and have little political refinement.
Perhaps that is why this electorate, fooled by the leftist propaganda of the "democratic" media (mainly foreign), voted in a certain group of political "dinosaurs" that once failed and had been removed from power.
In today's troubled world, when we are almost facing the prospect of a Third War breaking out in the Middle East, handing over power to the Total Opposition is a great threat to the Polish economy, the state's defense and the future of Polish stability.