Andrzej Duda: Polish president loyal to ruling right-wing

THAT FELLA THAT VISITED TRUMP THIS WEEK

FIGURED YOU MIGHT WANT TO KNOW ABOUT HIM

Issued on: 28/06/2020 -

Andrzej Duda on the campaign trail JANEK SKARZYNSKI AFP/File

ANTI-LGBTQ RIGHTS , ANTI-ABORTION,

ANTI-FEMINIST ANTI-HUMANIST ANTI-SEMITE

ANTI JUDICIAL INDEPENDENCE 

Warsaw (AFP)

Polish President Andrzej Duda, the frontrunner in an election Sunday that was delayed several weeks because of the coronavirus pandemic, is a loyal ally of the EU member's ruling conservatives.

Though Polish presidents wield limited power, a second five-year term for the 48-year-old lawyer would likely cement the governing right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) party's chances of moving ahead with its agenda.

Duda, who is predicted to be forced into a second-round run-off, has rarely said no to powerful PiS leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski and is known for waving through government policies like generous social benefits and controversial judicial changes.


"He's a party man, carrying out its orders," Warsaw-based political analyst Stanislaw Mocek said.

The one time Duda broke from the party came in 2017, when he vetoed two judicial reforms he believed gave too much power to the attorney general, who is also the justice minister, and curtailed his own.

The surprise veto left the PiS stunned and earned Duda applause from the liberal opposition and the European Union.

- Spiritual heir -

Born in 1972 to a family of professors in the southern city of Krakow, Duda was a choir boy and Boy Scout before earning a law degree from the Jagiellonian University in 1996.

When PiS first came to power in 2005, Duda was named deputy justice minister, a job he gave up in 2008 to become an aide to then president Lech Kaczynski, Jaroslaw's twin.

A devout Catholic, Duda was close to Lech Kaczynski -- who in 2010 died when his presidential jet crashed in Smolensk, Russia -- and often calls himself his "spiritual heir".

Duda also has the backing of the present-day incarnation of the Solidarity trade union that brought a peaceful end to communism at home in 1989.

He was elected to the Polish parliament in 2011, then to the European Parliament in 2014. But he only became well-known after Jaroslaw Kaczynski crowned him presidential candidate.

Duda went on to win the presidential election in May 2015, after promising voters social benefits galore in fiery campaign speeches always featuring his ready smile.

- Judicial changes -

Like Poland's powerful Catholic Church, Duda opposes in-vitro fertilisation and the 2011 Istanbul Convention, the world's first binding legal instrument to prevent and combat violence against women, which Poland ratified in 2015.

He is also in favour of tightening tPoland's anti-abortion law -- already among Europe's most restrictive -- and recently likened "LGBT ideology" to communism, drawing criticism at home and abroad.

On Duda's watch the retirement age for men was lowered from 67 to 65. The PiS also began giving parents a monthly allowance of 500 zloty (110 euro, $130) for every child.

In terms of foreign policy, Duda has worked on strengthening ties with NATO. Since he became head of state, the Western defence alliance and the United States have deployed their troops in the region in response to Russia's activity in neighbouring Ukraine.

Just four days before the election, Duda visited US President Donald Trump, who was lavish with his praise of his Polish "friend' -- the first foreign leader invited to the White House since the COVID-19 pandemic began.

Without going so far as to call himself a eurosceptic, Duda has in the past described the European Union as an "imaginary community from which we don't gain much."

Duda's critics fault him for his role in bringing to heel the Constitutional Court and other judicial institutions.

In 2017, the EU launched unprecedented proceedings against Poland over "systemic threats" posed by the reforms to the rule of law that could see its EU voting rights suspended.

An avid skier, Duda is married to German language teacher Agata. They have an adult daughter.

© 2020 AFP

Poles choose president in election delayed by pandemic
Issued on: 28/06/2020 -

Polish President Andrzej Duda is a key ally for the government Wojtek RADWANSKI AFP/File

Warsaw (AFP)

Concerns over democratic standards and bread and butter issues top the agenda as Poles vote on Sunday in round one of a tight presidential race that had to be postponed because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Incumbent Andrzej Duda, 48, is campaigning for re-election in a vote that could determine the future of the right-wing government that supports him.

Ten candidates are vying to replace him, but opinion polls show that Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski, a liberal from the main Civic Platform (PO) opposition party, will enter a neck-and-neck run-off on July 12.

Victory for Trzaskowski, also 48, would deal a heavy blow to the Law and Justice (PiS) government, which has relied on its ally Duda to endorse polarising legislation, especially judicial reforms.

While the PiS insists the changes are needed to weed out judicial corruption, critics and the European Union insist they erode judicial independence and democracy just three decades after Poland shed communism.

US President Donald Trump, who regards the populist PiS administration as a key European ally, gave Duda his blessing this week.

Trump invited him to the White House on Wednesday as the first foreign leader to visit since the coronavirus pandemic began, just four days ahead of election day.

Originally scheduled for May, the ballot was postponed due to the pandemic and a new hybrid system of postal and conventional voting will be in place on Sunday in a bid to stem infections.

While official figures show over 33,000 confirmed cases and more than 1,400 deaths, the health minister has admitted that there are likely up to 1.6 million undetected cases in Poland, an EU country of 38 million people.

- Anti-gay rhetoric -

Duda has promised to defend the governing party's raft of popular social benefits, including a child allowance and extra pension payments -- a key factor behind the populists winning a second term in October's parliamentary election.

Bread and butter issues are weighing heavily on voters' minds as the economic fallout of the pandemic is set to send Poland into its first recession since communism's demise.

"I'm happy. I can't complain; I get an extra pension payment and children are getting 500 zloty," Irena, a 63-year-old pensioner, told AFP in the central Polish town of Minsk Mazowiecki.

"I'd like this to continue," she added, declining to provide her surname.

Duda has also echoed PiS attacks on LGBT+ rights and Western values, something analysts see as a bid to attract voters backing a far-right candidate.

Campaigning with the slogan "Enough is Enough", Trzaskowski promises to use the experience and contacts he gathered as a former European affairs minister to "fight hard" for a fair slice of the EU's 2021-27 budget, and to repair tattered ties with Brussels.

He has however vowed to keep the PiS's popular welfare payments.

While many see his PO party as a weak and ineffectual opposition, Trzaskowski supporters regard him as a bulwark against the PiS's drive to reform the courts, something they insist risks destroying any notion of an independent judiciary.

"I'm a lawyer and this (PiS justice reforms) affect me directly," Marek, 60, told AFP in Minsk Mazowiecki, also declining to provide his surname.

"It's as if a blacksmith would go to a watchmaker's shop and try to put things in order. People might support it, but in the long run these reforms will have to be reversed."

- 'Budapest model'? -

Since winning power in 2015, both Duda and the PiS have in many ways upended Polish politics by stoking tensions with the EU and wielding influence through state-owned companies and public broadcasters.

Some analysts view the election as a crucial juncture: a second five-year term for Duda would allow the PiS to make even more controversial changes while defeat could unravel the party's power.

FASCISM BY ANY OTHER NAME 

A win for Duda would pave the way to "bolstering 'Eastern' tendencies, like the rise of oligarchs... and a drift to the Budapest model (of Hungary's Viktor Orban) – that's the danger," Warsaw University political scientist Anna Materska-Sosowska told AFP.

Polling stations will be open between 7:00 am and 9:00 pm (0500-1900 GMT) with an exit poll expected as soon as voting ends.

© 2020 AFP