Polls show popularity boost for Tusk’s party

After the surprising return to Polish politics of former European Council president and ex-prime minister of Poland, Donald Tusk, three Polish polling institutes have published the results of the latest polls on support for political parties.

While the results show that most people would vote for the currently ruling four-party far-right conservative bloc United Right (Law and Justice, United Poland, Agreement, Republican Party), the centre-right opposition Civic Coalition (Civic Platform and Modern) has started gaining in popularity again.

In a surprising return to Polish politics, former European Council president and ex-prime minister of Poland, Donald Tusk, was elected the head of Poland’s largest opposition party Civic Platform (PO) after seven years of absence in national politics last weekend.

Currently, two out of three polls, conducted by Opinie24 for radio RMF FM and by IBRiS for Polsat News, showed that the surge in popularity is still not large enough to overtake the nationalist ruling Law and Justice Party, but currently give the Civic Coalition second place.

Only one poll, conducted by social changes for the pro-government internet portal wPolityce, gave the party third place, but all three polls showed an overall increase in support for the civic coalition.

Commentators in Poland said, however, that not enough time has passed since Tusk announced his return to Polish politics last week and took over as leader of the Civic Platform to clearly assess the impact of this situation on popular support for political parties in Poland.

Many of them also believe that Tusk’s return could give the opposition the upper hand in trying to unite ahead of the 2023 parliamentary elections.

At the same time, the results of the three polls widely differed from each other.

If parliamentary elections were held in Poland this Sunday, the United Right could count on 24-29% of support, the Civic Coalition on 23-20% of support, the centrist Poland 2050 on 24% according to only one of the polls, and on 17-15% of support, according to the other two.

The parliament would also include deputies of the far-right Confederation (10-7% support) and the left-wing bloc Lewica (9-8% support). The conservative and agrarian Polish People’s Party would be outside the parliament. This party would be supported by 4-2% of respondents, while the electoral threshold in Poland is 5%. (Anna Wolska | EURACTIV.pl)