The right cheers over Nawrocki’s success

International reactions

Poland election: right cheer and “new headache”

The national conservative Karol Nawrocki wins the presidential election in Poland very tight. The reactions to it are sharply divided.

After Hungary, Slovakia, Italy and the Netherlands, Poland also voted for a candidate from the right in the presidential election. The 42-year-old Karol Nawrocki, a national conservative historian who headed a national memorial institute, promised in his election campaign that Poland was preferred to other nationalities, including refugees from neighboring Ukraine. Hungary’s right -wing populist Prime Minister Viktor Orbán spoke of a “fantastic victory”. The Dutch right -wing populist Geert Wilders tweeted: “Congratulations Poland for this patriotic president!”

The AfD bosses Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla said: “Europe is in motion, and that’s a good thing.” They wished Nawrocki “a good hand as well as the courage and size for a trusting cooperation for a European future in freedom and security that finally overcomes old trenches”.

The EU and Germany-critical Nawrocki came to 50.89 percent of the vote in the election. The pro -European government candidate, the Liberal Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski, accounted for 49.11 percent. In Poland, the President can block reform projects by the government via Veto. It was primarily ahead in rural areas, while Trzaskowski got more votes in the big cities. Prime Minister Donald Tusk announced the question of trust in parliament after his candidate failed.

Pro-European forces reacted reluctantly to the success of Nawrocki, a non-party politician who had started for the National Conservative Party “Law and Justice” by Jaroslaw Kaczynski. EU Commission President of the Leyen said that she is expecting a “very good” collaboration. During its reign until 2023, the PIS had ensured controversial judicial and media reforms that Poland was in the long-term dispute with the Commission on EU rights standards. The previous Polish President Andrzej Duda (PIS) had stopped several reform projects by the liberal Prime Minister Donald Tusk from the Citizens’ platform (PO).

Chancellor Friedrich Merz (CDU) congratulated the legal nationalist Karol Nawrocki on his victory in the presidential election in Poland and called on increased bilateral relationships. “In view of deep geopolitical changes, our two countries face major challenges”, which should be mastered together, Merz said on Monday evening. He wanted to “jointly” commit to “peace, freedom and prosperity in some Europe”.

The decisive argument of pro-European forces is bare numbers. According to a study by the German Economy Institute (IW) in Cologne, Poland was the largest net receiver among the EU countries in 2023. The surplus was 8.2 billion euros in 2023 (2022: 11.9 billion euros), with some distance behind Romania and Hungary with 6 billion and 4.6 billion euros per year. In addition, Poland receives around 59.8 billion euros from the Corona building dies, of which 25.3 billion euros in grants that do not have to be paid back.

The CDU politician Paul Ziemiak, who had first contacted for Merz in Poland, said on Deutschlandfunk that he was expecting a nationalist course of Nawrockis. His goal is likely to bring the chosen PIS back to power through early parliamentary elections.

The left accused Chancellor Friedrich Merz that he had promoted Nawrocki’s election victory with his migration policy and rejections at the borders. Left boss Ines Schwerdtner said that the choice must be an “alarm signal for all of us”, because the trend is about authoritarianism in many countries.