Record high voter turnout in cities and opposition forces leadership: how Poland’s parliamentary elections were held

According to about 50% of the early vote totals in Poland, the main trends remain the same as those the exit polls showed yesterday—United Right, the party of Jaroslaw Kaczynski, is significantly ahead of all other opponents, including Donald Tusk’s Civic Coalition. The gap reaches more than 10%, Kaczynski’s party still has 38%, and Donald Tusk’s political force has 27%.

Yurii Banakhovych, Ukrinform Ukrainian National News Agency correspondent in Warsaw made this report, during a discussion at the Media Center Ukraine – Ukrinform. 

“I think that these figures will change in the coming hours in favor of the opposition forces, because, in fact, it’s common for large cities residents in Poland to often vote in the afternoon. At some polling stations, elections were held even until three in the morning, despite the polling places’ work schedule till 9:00 PM. And it is clear that all polling stations have not yet processed the ballots, as the turnout spike,” he explained.

At the same time, Yurii Banakhovych explained that record turnout was recorded in large cities, in particular, due to the opposition electorate.

“It is no secret that the voters of Poland’s three biggest opposition parties: the Civic Coalition, the left-wing forces, and the Third Way are voters living in the country’s largest cities, in the voivodeship capitals. The task of the leaders of those parties was to mobilize as many voters from those large cities as possible to vote in larger numbers. In fact, they succeeded, inasmuch as according to preliminary exit polls, this turnout could even reach more than 73% in some cities. I’ve heard today that in Krakow, for example, it exceeded 80%. Poles voted in huge numbers. Given that the highest turnout during the general elections was back in 1989 when the first democratic elections in Poland took place when the turnout was 62%,” he said.

At the same time, Yurii Banakhovych added that the opposition parties gained this much support due to the voters of the opposition electorate in large cities who were mobilized like never before and went to polls.

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