Poland’s opposition parties have signed a coalition deal, paving the way for them to form a new government after winning the majority of votes in elections last month. But they will have to wait.
Donald Tusk, the opposition’s candidate for prime minister, announced on Friday that a deal had been reached. The group includes various ideologies but united around strengthening Poland’s ties to the European Union.
“We are ready to take responsibility for Poland in the coming years,” Tusk, a former prime minister and head of the liberal Civic Coalition (KO) told reporters.
The parties, which include Civic Coalition, the economically liberal Third Way, and the left-leaning New Left, garnered a collective majority of votes in the October 15 election.
But President Andrzej Duda has given the governing nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) party, which took more votes than any single party in the elections, the first shot at forming a government.
That effort is widely expected to fail, and the opposition, calling themselves the “democratic opposition”, have pledged to strengthen democracy in Poland after PiS was accused of undermining the independence of the judiciary during its eight years in power.
A series of judicial changes, instituted in 2019, blocked Polish courts from applying EU laws in certain areas and barred courts from referring legal questions to the top EU court, the European Court of Justice (ECJ).
