Poland waits for final election result after ruling party, opposition claim win
- Sunday’s parliamentary election was seen as the most pivotal in Poland in decades
- Polish opposition leader Donald Tusk declared the beginning of a new era
Poles faced a period of political uncertainty on Monday after they voted in huge numbers in an election in which opposition parties appeared to gain a combined majority.
But the ruling nationalist conservative party won more votes than any single party and said it would try to keep governing.
The state electoral commission hasn’t reported the final results. But polling agency Ipsos released a so-called late poll Monday morning, which combined the results of an exit poll carried out during Sunday’s election and 50 per cent of the votes counted.
The poll results showed the ruling nationalist conservative Law and Justice party with 36.6 per cent of the votes cast, the opposition Civic Coalition, led by Donald Tusk, with 31 per cent, the centrist Third Way coalition with 13.5 per cent, the Left party with 8.6 per cent and the far-right Confederation with 6.4 per cent.
“Democracy has won,” Tusk, a former European Union chief declared late on Sunday, saying a “grim” era had ended.
In order for a government to pass laws, it needs at least 231 seats in the 460-lower house of parliament, the Sejm.
