In 2019, Poland featured three pivotal political events that will shape Polish politics for some time to come, according to the publicist Pitor Semka.
The first was the Law and Justice (PiS) party’s victory during European Parliament elections. Despite PiS’ absolute majority victory in the Polish parliamentary elections, Semka told portal dorzeczy.pl that the European Parliament elections were far more impactful in 2019. Without a victory in those elections, PiS would not have won in October and Poland would have an entirely different political landscape.
He added that the scale of the victory in the European Parliament elections demobilized the electorate in October, which led to the defeat of the United Right in the Senate.
Semka referred to Donald Tusk’s decision to not run in the presidential elections as the second major event in Polish politics.
The publicist emphasized that apart from Tusk’s party, Civic Platform, scoring a victory in 2007, Tusk has been given the majority of his successes by Germans, such as his position as President of the European Council or the head of the European People’s Party.
Semka says the third major event in Polish politics was the splitting of the Polish political scene, as it helped move Polish politics beyond the division between PiS and PO and offered new options on both the left and right.
