by Carrie
Sun Oct 21st, 2007 at 11:03:03 AM EST
From the apparently sparse English-language coverage of the Polish general election so far...
Independent (IE): Voting begins in Polish general election (October 21 2007)
Poland is voting in its general election today.
The snap election called two years earlier than planned sees the current Law and Justice party government led by Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski face stiff competition from the opposition Civic Platform.
Today's election follows allegations of corruption against the current government.
Update [2007-10-21 17:5:28 by DoDo]: Check comments for exit polls and results.
Wikipedia has a summary:
Parties will be competing for all 460 seats in the Sejm and all 100 seats in the Senate. The election will be a contest between the two largest parties, the ruling Law and Justice party and the largest opposition group, the Civic Platform, for first place, with the Left and Democrats coalition group likely to come in third. The other parties, most notably League of the Republic’s Right (formed from a coalition of the League of Polish Families, Real Politics Union and some other right-wing groups), the Self-Defense of the Republic of Poland and the Polish People's Party, will be fighting hard to overcome the 5% electoral threshold for election to the Sejm.
The Polish Twins and their Law and Justice (PiS) party seem to have worn down their welcome after only two years in office, and the Europhillic Neoliberals of the Civic Platform (PO) seem poised to win the election with overwhelming support from Poles abroad. Having led the opposition over the last two years, it doesn't look like there will be a PO-PiS government, which was expected after the 2005 election but didn't materialize.
Minor parties have formed coalitions in an attempt to get around the 5% threshold to get seats in parliament. In a refreshing new development since the 2005 election, the Social Liberals appear likely to be the third force, ahead of the right-wing social conservative coalition around League of Polish Families, Self-defence (Samoobrona) and the peasant Polish People's Party.
In a deeply conservative and Catholic country, the electoral campaign has been rocked by the Women's Party
[Torygraph Alert]
Polish women strip off in bid to woo voters (26/09/2007)
Seven candidates from the Women's Party are featured posing behind a billboard that reads: "The party of women. Poland is a woman."
The attention-grabbing move is making waves in staunchly Catholic Poland, where the ruling Kaczynski twins have pushed a fiercely conservative agenda.
Writer Manuela Gretkowska said she founded the party as the Polish government considered tightening already strict controls on abortion.
DoDo adds: We are in the blogosphere, so here is a Polish blog (a liberal one): the beatroot
He reports that participation (abysmally low last time) looks to be higher; argues that the expat vote won't count, fears PiS will win anyway, and criticises everyone.
