On Thursday evening, Polish MPs voted 234 to 210, with seven abstentions, to pass a resolution announcing the referendum, state news agency PAP reported.
The ruling conservatives voted in favour, while most opposition groups, including the centrist Civic Coalition (KO), were against. Most MPs from the far-right Confederation group abstained.
The vote followed a heated debate earlier in the day.
Four referendum questions
The government of conservative Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki has proposed putting four referendum questions to voters:
1) “Do you support the sale of state assets to foreign buyers, causing the Polish people to lose control over strategic sectors of the economy?”
2) “Are you in favour of raising the retirement age, including the reintroduction of a higher retirement age of 67 years for men and women?”
3) “Are you in favour of dismantling the wall on Poland’s border with Belarus?”
4) “Are you in favour of admitting thousands of illegal migrants from the Middle East and Africa under the mandatory relocation mechanism imposed by the European bureaucracy?”
The Polish prime minister told MPs on Wednesday that “giving the people a say in a referendum is what democracy is all about."
Meanwhile, opposition leader Donald Tusk, a former prime minister, has denounced the planned referendum as a political ploy by the governing conservatives to boost their performance in the parliamentary election.
(pm/gs)
Source: IAR, PAP