Poland
The Polish people oppose the central government trying to control local elections
Classified Polnews
Warsaw, Poland July 25, 2006 - Only after a heated debate in the Polish parliament was the Polish coalition, led by the political party, Law and Justice, able to get a proposed a bill that changes the local election law sent to committee. Sending that bill to committee required the cooperation of coalition party Samoobrona. But now Samoobrona, local Polish governments that will be affected by the bill and 88 percent of the Polish people surveyed, oppose that bill.
In its current form the bill will allow the formation of election blocks that will allow the combination of votes in local elections. After originally supporting the bill, Samoobrona has suddenly realized that the bill favors a larger parties and that they are liable to lose position and the number of seats in local governments.
Local governments say that these election blocks will prevent smaller local political groups from getting any seats in the local governments.
Some commentators believe that what will happen is that the election blocs would put people into local governments and these people would be controlled directly from Warsaw. This would effectively emasculate local control of local governments and put control back in the hands of political leaders in Warsaw.
Some believe that this is a return to central planning and control of all government by one political party.
The people who drafted the bill have openly stated that it has holes.
Samoobrona has said that it will not support the bill in its current form. They say that the bill favors larger parties and hurts the small parties.
And the Law and Justice Party has responded as it always does. If Samoobrona does not support the bill, the Law and Justice Party will send the country to new elections.
With 88% of the people not supporting the bill, sending the country to new elections may benefit Samoobrona if they continue to oppose the bill. If they support the bill, they may lose positions in the local governments where there are currently strong.
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