A shocking upset hands Poland's presidency to a far-right populist with a scandal-ridden past and extremist allies.

[Celerity]

https://www.socialeurope.eu/polands-war-against-itself



It was the strangest electoral campaign in modern Polish history, with an obviously qualified candidate losing by a sliver to a man who had no business being on the ballot. Rafał Trzaskowski, the mayor of Warsaw, speaks five languages and has served as a government minister and a member of the European Parliament, whereas Karol Nawrocki, the head of the Institute of National Remembrance, was previously unknown.

Worse, reporting throughout the campaign revealed shocking facts about Nawrocki’s past. A violent former football hooligan and a friend of people convicted for serious crimes, his candidacy was conjured out of thin air by Jarosław Kaczyński, the longtime leader of the illiberal, populist former governing party, Law and Justice (PiS). Nawrocki has been accused of operating as a pimp at the Grand Hotel in Sopot two decades ago, and of extorting an apartment from a disabled elderly man. Are these the only skeletons in his closet?

The answer hardly matters to Poland’s far-right voters. Like Donald Trump’s supporters, there is no level of criminality that would turn them against their tribe’s totem. While exit polls on election night showed Trzaskowski in the lead (50.30% to 49.70%), the final results delivered a victory for Nawrocki (50.9% to 49.1%). Not for the first time, Poland has become a global laughingstock. We can fight wars and rise up against dictatorships – as Solidarity did in overthrowing communism – but apparently we are incapable of sustaining normal, serious governance. Whatever we build, we immediately set out to destroy.

Poles seem to have forgotten that their country once disappeared from the map of Europe; that their national security depends on competent, responsible government. Despite a revanchist Russia waging war on Ukraine next door, they have opted for feckless fanaticism yet again. For the next five years, the presidency will be controlled by populist right-wing forces sympathetic to friends of Russian President Vladimir Putin such as Viktor Orbán. Moreover, PiS is not the only right-wing party to have had a good election. In the first round, Sławomir Mentzen of the far-right, nationalist, anti-Ukrainian Confederation won almost 15% of the vote, and the openly anti-Semitic Grzegorz Braun won over 6%.

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[D_Master81]

1. How does this happen?

I thought the rest of the world was beginning the shift away from far right candidates but maybe it was isolated to those countries. Either way the world still has a long way to go to get out of this era

[Botany]

2. Russian help?

Just a guess.