Szymon Hołownia, the lower house or Sejm's current speaker, heads a small party Poland 2050 which ran together in the 2023 general election with the rural-based PSL to form Third Way. Third Way is one of the three political groups currently ruling Poland, along with Donald Tusk's Civic Coalition (KO) and The Left.
Hołownia has spoken to journalists answering questions about the state of the ruling coalition(s) from his perspective. He summed up the situation saying that his 'smaller coalition' Third Way gets a "B+" for its cooperation. He also forecasts that the larger coalition will survive as Poland's government to the end of the current term.
However, he may be putting a brave face on troubles both for Third Way and the government.
Third Way received 14.44% of the votes in last year's general election, halved to 7.3% in the recent EU elections. Pollsters have found that Third Way voters have been moving over to the largest party in the government - KO. This has been a pattern for smaller coalition partners in Poland which tend to get "swallowed up" by the larger parties.
Hołownia's own personal prospects for his political career also seem under threat. The first six months of the new government saw him shine in his new role as Sejm speaker with several polls and commentators, including Radio Poland, seeing him as a strong contender for the presidency:
This morning's column in Poland's daily Rzeczpospolita asks if the "chandelier" (the Presidential Palace) is "getting away from Hołownia".
The larger ruling coalition also has its woes. The Left's leaders have expressed more than once dissatisfaction when their priorities have been put on the back burner. Hołownia is seen as a "double problem": his (albeit liberal) Catholicism led to the postponement of work on liberalising access to abortion and the role of speaker, currently played by Hołownia, is supposed to "rotate" around the coalition partners.
Left leader Anna Maria Żukowska has said that The Left should leave the coalition if this promise is not kept. A failure to pass on the speaker's position would presumably be seen as an ongoing threat to left initiatives.
Sources: PAP, Rzeczpospolita, tvn24, dorzeczy.pl, Radio Poland
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