Polish President Andrzej Duda voiced his displeasure with the new presidential candidate from his party, Karol Nawrocki, Euractiv reported.
Duda is due to finish his second term in 2025 and will not be able to run for another term. Therefore, PiS was forced to find another candidate for next year’s elections. The choice fell on Nawrocki, the president of the Institute of National Remembrance (IPN).
Speaking about the presidential candidates at a press conference in Armenia last week, Duda forgot Nawrocki but recalled the names of the remaining nominees, including Donald Tusk of the Civic Coalition and Rafał Trzaskowski, the incumbent mayor of Warsaw.
I like the fact that the formation of the group of candidates for Polish president is ongoing. […] The Civic Coalition has presented its candidate, Mr Rafał Trzaskowski. PiS supports the civic candidate… Mr Karol Nawrocki.
Experts speculate that Duda may have felt insulted that he was not even asked about what happens next with the presidential election. Agata Adamek from the private TVN24 channel claimed:
He feels like a politician who actually accomplished a task that, when he was running for president, seemed impossible.
According to Adamek, Duda allegedly considered national-oriented candidate Sławomir Mentzen “a more interesting candidate.” Mentzen, 38, is co-chairman of the Confederation Party and has served in the Polish parliament since last year.
Poland is due to hold presidential elections on 11 or 18 May 2025. The speaker of parliament, Szymon Hołownia, will set the date on 8 January. Five candidates have been nominated for the presidency: in addition to Trzaskowski, Nawrocki and Mentzen, Hołownia and the Republican Marek Jakubiak plan to compete for the presidency.
