Poland’s main political forces met today at an extraordinary meeting, dubbed the “round table”, in order to discuss the possibilities for the still upcoming presidential election. It seems that the 28th June is now a realistic date on which to hold the first round of the election, since the ruling party and opposition parties agree on this date.
Law and Justice party politicians are arguing that the best date for the presidential elections would be the end of June or the beginning of July in order to closely follow the Polish constitution.
“We succeeded in coming to an agreement on one thing, that the elections should be set on such a date that the continuation of the presidential office will be preserved. In addition, the president will be sworn into office before August 6, 2020”, stated Marek Suski, deputy chairman of the Law and Justice parliamentary club.
Last week the lower house, the Sejm, approved the new election bill, which allows the running of the presidential elections in a hybrid mode, which means that depending on the pandemic conditions in a given locality, the elections might be in the traditional form or, where necessary, the elections might be by postal ballot only. This week, the bill is before three Senate committees.
“We are calling on the Senate to proceed with the bill with no delays. Do not block the congressional flow of the bill, do not block that bill. Konfederation moved to consider seven amendments of the text of the bill, and I have them here with me. The debate in the Senate will be a good occasion to remember our amendments and push for our changes to be incorporated in the text of the bill and solve this electoral crisis”, commented Krzysztof Bosak, the presidential candidate of the Confederation party.
Law and Justice politicians have been calling on the Senate Speaker for weeks to proceed smoothly with the election legislation in order to save time for everyone involved. The Senate took the full allowable limit of 30 days when they proceeded to consider the previous, all postal ballot bill. This time, as RMF FM radio has reported unofficially, the approach will be different. They claim they know that the Senate will assemble early next week.
If the Senate actually deals with the new presidential election bill at the beginning of next week, it may be sent to the Sejm in the same week, and later to the president for signing, which will allow the first round of the election to be held on 28th June.