Democracy Digest: Polish Elections, Slovak ‘Watergate’, Take Centre Stage

Warsaw mayor Rafal Trzaskowski raised over 1.6 million signatures to register his candidacy for the presidential elections on June 28 in the five days he was given for the task. By law, he needed 100,000 for his candidacy to be validated. Rather than complicate his mission, however, the short deadline seems to have helped Trzaskowski by mobilising his supporters and creating more momentum for his campaign.

An aggregate of 20 polls conducted since his candidature was announced, compiled by political scientist Ben Stanley, gave Trzaskowski the support of 28 per cent of voters in the first round of voting, against 42 per cent for the incumbent, Duda. The same analysis suggests that, in a second round, another opposition candidate, the independent Szymon Holownia, would have the best chance of defeating Duda.

Police this week arrested two activists who were a part of a group hanging posters critical of Health Minister Lukasz Szumowski in Warsaw. The group was removing existing bus stop ads and replacing them with posters criticising Szumowski's handling of the coronavirus pandemic and his alleged conflict of interest in the purchases of medical supplies.

Police arrested the two on suspicion of burglary. After the arrest, police searched one of the activist's homes on Monday, without showing a search warrant. The activist was kept in detention overnight, without charges being pressed. Local NGOs accused the police of acting disproportionately with the intent of discouraging further similar protests. Members of the government, led by the Law and Justice party, PiS, spoke out against the protest action at a press conference, accusing Warsaw mayor Trzaskowski of being involved.

Igor Matovic (L), leader of the Ordinary People and Independent...