Poles Vote for President, Incumbent Komorowski Tipped to Win
Poles voted Sunday in presidential elections after a lackluster campaign focused on national security and social issues, with incumbent Bronislaw Komorowski expected to win, but not without a struggle.
The 62-year-old historian, who was elected in 2010 and is close to the governing centrist Civic Platform (PO) party, appears unlikely to secure a second five-year term without a run-off vote on May 24.
While Komorowski has focused on the national security challenges Warsaw faces amid heightened tensions with Moscow over the Ukraine crisis, analysts say his rivals are trying to appeal to disenchanted voters by pledging to lower the retirement age and to bring taxes down.
Voting got underway at 7 am with the polls due to close at 9 pm.
Mieczyslaw Jankowski, a worker from Warsaw in his early 60s, told AFP he'd be voting for Komorowski's rival Andrzej Duda, a 42-year-old lawyer.
"Duda, only Duda," he said. "I was hoping to retire soon, but Komorowski and his friends changed the retirement age to 67. Duda promised to change that."
High social insurance premiums and the governing PO's unkept promises on tax reforms for small businesses have also undermined support for Komorowski.
"I'm working longer and longer hours just to pay my social insurance premiums and taxes -- promises made by Mr. Komorowski's friends in the PO haven't been kept," Krzysztof, a 41-year-old Warsaw cab driver who declined to provide his last name, said.
"I won't be voting for him (Komorowski) this time around," he added.
For Komorowski, a former defense minister, national security is a key issue, particularly as Poland faces a militarily resurgent Russia.
"It's been a long time since an armed conflict has been as close to Polish borders as the one today," he warned last weekend, evoking Russia's "aggression" against neighboring Ukraine.
"We're voting for Bronek (Komorowski) because he's the most normal candidate in terms of his character," hairdresser Renata Banachowicz said as she was about to cast her ballot in the capital Warsaw.
"He very stable and hasn't started a war with anyone. Things could be different with someone who's a loose cannon," said husband Wieslaw, a driver.
According to political analyst Eryk Mistewicz, the campaign has "highlighted a divide between people who benefited during the 25 years since the fall of communism in 1989, and those who feel lost".
"Komorowski is backed by voters who think Poland has benefited from its renewed freedom, while all other candidates are supported by people who are unhappy," he said, referring to other 10 presidential contenders.
Poland is also gearing up for a parliamentary election this fall with early opinion polls pegging the PO only narrowly ahead of its main rival, the conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party.
PiS presidential candidate Duda has promised voters generous social benefits in fiery campaign speeches.
"His promises go well beyond the powers of the president and his generous economic proposals could even ruin the (much larger) German budget," said Radoslaw Markowski, a political scientist at the Polish Academy of Sciences.
Komorowski has lost considerable steam in opinion polls -- from almost 50 percent support a few months ago to less than 40 percent days before the ballot -- while Duda is just shy of 30 percent backing.
Anti-establishment musician and rock star Pawel Kukiz is tipped to burst out of nowhere into third spot with up to 15 percent support, thanks to a growing young and disillusioned electorate.
Marginally popular contenders include a leftist political unknown with model good looks, and five populist right-wingers.
Duda can also count on support from the Solidarity trade union and backs Poland's powerful Catholic Church's opposition to in-vitro fertilization, unlike Komorowski.
Presidential powers are limited to initiating and vetoing legislation and steering defense and foreign policy in Poland, an EU and NATO member of 38 million people that has grown into central Europe's political and economic heavyweight since it shed communism in 1989.
Source: Agence France Presse
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