We have been sounding the alarm about this for months. The presidential campaign had nothing to do with fair competition and the entire state apparatus was used to support Rafal Trzaskowski. Money was taken away from the Right and Justice party, and the civic candidate was subjected to a total lynch mob, a heist and covered in an avalanche of slanders crafted on the basis of information extracted from the services. The whole thing is rounded off by the funding of lying spots and promotion by foreign centres. The Prime Minister himself was at the forefront of the hate campaign, and by repeating slanders and scaring Poles, he joined the disinformation campaign. Is this what a healthy state looks like? The OSCE report released today, although written in the language of diplomacy, is downright crushing for those in power and their media allies. And it is no longer just the voice of the opposition or conservative columnists. It is an international diagnosis that makes one ask fundamental questions about the future of Donald Tusk and his coalition. Karol Nawrocki’s win has reversed the vectors. We are about to find out.

Campaigning on the steroids of power

It was clear from the start that Donald Tusk’s government does not even intend to pretend neutrality. And it is no longer even about leaving the role of the forcibly taken over Polish Television in liquidation, Polish Radio and PAP. Today, no one even remembers anymore that the public media should be a guarantor of pluralism. ‘Clear water’ is a tool of pusillanimous propaganda and no one is surprised by this anymore. Rafal Trzaskowski even bought himself a presidential debate on neo-TVP. The OSCE explicitly points out that the line between the state and the ruling party has been blurred and that government officials have not hesitated to engage in election agitation. These are not minor lapses. They are systemic distortions of the electoral process. And yet Karol Nawrocki won against the all powerful machine of propaganda and hatred. Moreover, he won the second best result in the history of presidential elections. The first was Lech Wałęsa in 1990, but it must be remembered that this was a vote against communism, after several decades of Soviet enslavement.

The brutal truth about democracy in Tusk’s country

The OSCE report leaves no illusions! The elections were technically conducted professionally, but the entire political and media environment did not meet democratic standards. The OSCE report leaves no doubt that the elections were conducted professionally and technically, but the entire political and media environment did not meet democratic standards. It is the NASK that, as the OSCE points out, has contributed to the restriction of information pluralism, which should be unthinkable in a free country. In the last weeks of the campaign, we wrote about reports revealed by WP, according to which “people linked to the US Democratic Party are behind the international network of companies through which money for advertisements influencing the Polish presidential election passed”. It also turned out that there had already been attempts to interfere in Polish politics earlier, during the parliamentary elections! The group responsible for publishing political advertisements encouraging people to vote for Rafał Trzaskowski and attacking Nawrocki or Mentzen was already active in 2023. Before the parliamentary elections, it spent almost PLN 1.5 million on ads. The adverts were both politically neutral and attacking PiS and Confederation politicians with the slogan ‘Don’t let them govern’.

Polarisation and contempt for voters

The campaign was marked by contempt for a huge section of the population. Today, it appears that 10 million 606 thousand 877 people turned out for the presidential election. Right-wing voters were portrayed as second-class citizens and their demands as a threat to the “progressive” vision of Poland. Such a narrative not only divides society, but undermines the foundations of the national community. The OSCE rightly draws attention to the growing polarisation and the lack of a fair debate in which every voice would have a chance to resonate. An unbelievable attack was also aimed at the opposition candidate, with Karol Nawrocki being vilified to the extreme. Suffice it to say that the Prime Minister himself called him a gangster. Here is a sample of the hate spots:

What next? Tusk should leave with the government

Donald Tusk cannot swallow defeat. He has so far failed to get around to congratulating the president-elect. Trzaskowski’s defeat must hurt all the more because it seemed like a mere formality after all. He put absolutely everything on the line and used every means possible. However, the Poles have once again shown that they are immune to manipulation! In a state discredited by Tusk, the majority voice of the people has been heard. Now is the time for accountability. The international OSCE report is a clear signal that if the Tusk state wants to be treated as a mature democracy, it must return to the basics - fairness, pluralism, respect for every voter. Those in power should respond to the allegations. The ‘militant democracy’ invented by Tusk must finally be held to account. The OSCE has called it by its name. Now it is time for other institutions to follow. What will happen next? Things are boiling in the coalition, everyone is throwing around responsibility for the failure. Donald Tusk is well aware of this, which is why he is trying to protect himself with a ‘vote of confidence in the government’.

Any honourable prime minister in such a situation would have announced his resignation. Tusk, on the contrary, has announced that he will not take a step back and will not be stopped by the successor of President Andrzej Duda (to whom - nota bene - he has been counting down the days to the end of his term of office so derisively). Today, it is Karol Nawrocki’s voters who are counting down the days to the end of the coalition’s term of office on 13 December. Donald Tusk will do everything to make it last as long as possible. For although he has failed to “close the system”, he carries the burden of the tasks imposed on him by Berlin and Brussels. So he is declaring a new era of overseerism and promising a fierce fight. Only now, after Trzaskowski’s defeat and such a strongly expressed dislike of the government, will his team be interested in continuing to violate the rule of law and become embroiled in a pathological power structure? Something seems to be starting to crack after all. Charles Nawrocki’s win has reversed the vectors. We will soon find out.