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Poland's Prime Minister Threatens His Own Party With New Elections To Save It

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In order to prevent politicians from leaving his party and forming a new parliamentary club, Poland's Prime Minister has threatened to call new elections.

Poland's Prime Minister

The dispute over the proposed amendments to the Polish Constitution that would have changed the provisions related to abortion have created more of a divide between the two main groups that make up the Prime Minister's party, Law And Justice. And the divide may result in a breakup of the party.

Marek Jurek, who resigned as the Speaker of the Polish Parliament and subsequently also resigned from the Law And Justice Party, is a member of the ultra-conservative Roman Catholic part of the party. That group is generally made up of people from the old party ZCHN.

At the time of the vote on the abortion amendments, more than 50 members of the Law And Justice Party sided with Jurek against the Prime Minister and the President and voted their proposal down.

Jurek resigned from the party and has not yet been followed by any of that group. Poland's Government In Danger Of Falling As Polish Politicians Squabble

He has support. In an election poll held just after the vote, more than 4% of the respondents did not choose any of the candidates offered by the pollster but volunteered that they would vote for a party headed by Jurek. That 4% was higher than the combined percentage of the two coalition parties Samoobrona and LPR.

Jurek can form his own parliamentary club if he gets 14 others to join him. And if he really has the public support that the election poll shows, he could definitely improve his political leverage in the Parliament.

Jurek has made his move and left the Law And Justice Party. To discourage others from leaving, the Prime Minister has said that new elections are always a possibility in a democracy.

But when it comes to threats about early elections, no one takes the Prime Minister seriously anymore.

Bronislaw Komorwski, a senior member of the opposition party Civic Platform and Vice Speaker of the Parliament, said that first Kaczynski threatened the Civic Platform with new elections, then he threatened his collation partners with new elections and now he is threatening his own party. He just threatens.

Some think that the polls show that it would be too dangerous for Kaczynski to force new elections and safe for Jurek to form a new party and force a new coalition on Kaczynski. Jurek and his group would achieve more leverage than they have now.