Poland

Lepper as Deputy Prime Minister or no coalition

Classified Polnews

  Samoobrona party leader, Andrzej Lepper, has given his conditions for forming a coalition with the ruling Polish political party Law and Justice. Lepper said that without Andrzej Lepper as Deputy Prime Minister of the Polish government there will be no coalition between Samoobrona and the Law and Justice party. Along with his demand for the position of Deputy Prime Minister, Lepper listed those things that he expected the Law and Justice Party to agree to. On that list were things such as regulation of the supermarkets, a 10% corporate tax, a change to the work code, changing how the National Bank of Poland is regulated and a myriad of other programs which have in the past not been acceptable to the Law and Justice party.

  Just this week President Lech Kaczynski, who is a member of the Law and Justice Party that is headed by his brother, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, ruled out a coalition with the major opposition party Civic Platform. He said that he did not rule out a coalition with Andrzej Lepper ' s party, Samoobrona. When questioned about the Andrzej Lepper ' s demands, Law and Justice Party spokesman to Reshevsky responded by saying that in light of the upcoming anniversary of Pope John Paul II death, it was time for reflection so his party would not make any comment now.

  Going into coalition with the Samoobrona party would represent somewhat of an embarrassment to many Law and Justice deputies because Andrzej Lepper is the person who was highly criticized by their party as being a criminal and the former governing party, SLD, was criticized severely for having some behind-the-scenes political cooperation to get the support of Andrzej Lepper for certain legislation. Now bringing this man, who they called a criminal, into the Polish government as a coalition partner would be to some, the pinnacle of hypocrisy.

  The Leader of the political party Law and Justice, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, will have his say in the matter. But the key to which way things go probably lies in the hands of the Prime Minister, Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz, who is very happy with the performance of his government and it seems would not the interested in bringing radical left people from Samoobrona into his government.