A one horse race?
By : Anna Kocinska
With 13 days to go, opinion polls indicate that incumbent President Aleksander Kwasniewski continues to lead the race by a hefty margin against his 12 rivals.
Since launching his reelection campaign in June, the Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) candidate has met some 500,000 people campaigning in more than 100 locations around the country. "Almost every day, except those days when he is busy as president, he holds three to four electoral meetings, has four interviews and holds a press conference," said Dariusz Szymczycha, spokesman for Kwasniewski's electoral team and former editor in chief of Trybuna, a left-wing daily.
"My candidate's campaign is extremely active. How much sleep does he get? Too little."
On the night of Sept. 19, Kwasniewski didn't get much sleep either, Szymczycha said, as the president stayed awake to watch live coverage of the Olympic Games from Sydney. After the games' first few days, when Polish sport fans had little to get excited about, Renata Mauer-Rozanska garnered the Olympic gold in the 50-meter rifle-three position and Marek Staniszewski and Krzysztof Kolomanski picked up the silver medal in mountain kayaking. "We have two medals. I am firmly convinced that it's only because (Kwasniewski, who was Poland's sports minister for six years under communism) was watching," Szymczycha said.
At the same time, viewers of public broadcaster Telewizja Polska (TVP) had a chance to see Kwasniewski operate in his natural element sports first during coverage of the opening of the Olympic Games and then at his meeting with Polish athletes in the Olympic village, Szymczycha said. One of Kwasniewski's presidential rivals, Marian Krzaklewski, leader of the ruling Solidarity Election Action (AWS) government and head of the Solidarity trade union, immediately struck back. In a letter addressed to the State Electoral Committee (PKW) and the National Radio and Television Council (KRRiTV), Krzaklewski protested against the unfair and "free of charge" presentation of Kwasniewski in TVP's coverage from Sydney.
"When Krzaklewski speaks in the presence of the bishop, we don't protest," Szymczycha said. "Everybody has his natural environment." But Krzaklewski has not been the only presidential candidate accusing TVP of biased coverage. Imbalanced air time, a nightmare for any presidential prospect, has become a focal point of debate among this year's candidates.
Battling for air
"We didn't expect that it would be so hard to get our message through to public media," said Leszek Samborski, head of Janusz Korwin-Mikke's Union of Real Politics (UPR) election team. "The problem is that TVP is run by one political affiliation," he said. "It's monstrous what they do with their coverage. Take the continuous voice-overs of candidates and no chance to hear what they really said, but we can't do anything about it."
According to Joanna Stepien, spokesman for Juliusz Braun, chairman of media watchdog KRRiTV, the council does monitor campaign coverage in public media. "The chairman (Braun), when speaking publicly, doesn't hide the fact that TVP makes mistakes while covering the campaign," Stepien said. "But we cannot react in such a way that we immediately ban the broadcast of a certain program."
While Kwasniewski's electoral team said it had no objections to TVP's coverage, other teams continue to send protests to the PKW or corrections directly to the public broadcaster. "(Presidential candidate) Andrzej Olechowski has been heard only once in the news during the campaign, when his granddaughter was born, in all other cases what we get is the voice-over," said Agnieszka Liszka, Olechowski's press liason. "We keep sending corrections to TVP because journalists either carelessly or unprofessionally change his words."
Representatives of the electoral teams of Dariusz Grabowski, Krzaklewski, Jan Lopuszanski (Polish Alliance), former Prime Minister Jan Olszewski, and former President Lech Walesa, sent letters to the PKW protesting against the quality of TVP's campaign coverage. According to the five candidates, TVP does not guarantee impartiality. "We cannot agree to the practice of approving the electoral TV spots by members of Aleksander Kwasniewski's electoral team," reads the letter. Robert Kwiatkowski, TVP's president; Andrzej Kwiatkowski, one of TVP's main political journalists; and Slawomir Zielinski, director of TVP1, all of whom were named in the letter, were, according to the five teams, members of Kwasniewski's electoral team in 1995. While Kwasniewski's team denied the accusation, according to the letter's signatories the president's campaigners could have access to the station's electoral segments the day before their emission.
The spectrum of TVP's critics is not limited to right-leaning or centrist candidates, however. Jaroslaw Kalinowski, a presidential hopeful representing the Polish Peasants Party (PSL), which once formed a ruling coalition with SLD prior to 1997, joined the chorus of critics after one of TVP's recent electoral programs. "Tygodnik Wyborczy Jedynki" had apparently described an element of Kalinowski's electoral program inaccurately. Last week, the Warsaw Regional Court ordered TVP to air a correction.
But what also bothers presidential candidates is the fact that such distorted coverage of the electoral campaign deprives voters of coherent information on their electoral programs.
Diapers vs. electoral issues
"This campaign is like an advertising campaign for diapers," said Maciej Jankowski, the spokesman for Olechowski's campaign. "It's nice and smooth but what we need is a debate among candidates. It's the only way in which they can gain credibility among voters."
According to Jankowski, his candidate has been adamant about staging open debates with his rivals about such issues as unemployment, foreign policy and taxes. "But Kwasniewski and Krzaklewski said 'No' immediately, only Kalinowski agreed," he said. "Kwasniewski justified his 'Nope' by saying that there were too many candidates. He also said he is so popular he doesn't need to explain what he's going to do. In my opinion he is afraid of a confrontation."
A U.S.-styled campaign is not yet possible in Poland, Szymczycha said. "Maybe in 20 years when we have two to three strong parties," he said. "Today, we have 13 candidates and it's not possible to have a reasonable debate under such conditions. Besides, television does not play such an important role in Poland as it does in the States."
Meanwhile, most of TVP's electoral programs, such as "Tygodnik Wyborczy Jedynki" and "Forum Wyborcze" feature studio discussions with economists, journalists, commentators or representatives of electoral teams but not the candidates themselves.
"I am surprised that we can't hear candidates on such programs, after all, we will vote for concrete persons, won't we?" said Liszka, Olechowski's press spokesman.
Most candidates agree that the present campaign in the media conveys no programming message whatsoever. According to Jankowski, the voters that he's met all over the country are largely uninformed. "You can see it quite clearly. They keep asking basic questions about Olechowski's program because they simply don't know anything about it," he said. "In a normal campaign, (elsewhere) in the world, they would have heard about it two months ago."
According to Rafal Rastawicki, the person responsible for electoral programs at TVP, it's in the viewer's interest that there not be a direct debate among candidates, but that debates be moderated. "Journalists are usually not satisfied with any random answer and are able to get information on issues that are interesting for the audience," he said. "Besides, we're doing programs for viewers and it's they who validate what we do." According to estimates made by AGB Polska, a market research institute, TVP's electoral programs are popular. On Sept. 12, "Tygodnik Wyborczy Jedynki" attracted 25% of the viewing audience while the Olympics, which aired on Sept. 19, nabbed only 10.6%. "The fact that the criticism of TVP came from all directions of the political scene means that we are in the center," Rastawicki said. "That variation of critics proves that what we do, we possibly do impartially." According to Jankowski, however, with TVP acting like the presidential office's branch, the running candidates have nowhere else to go. "Private media, under the law, can't really get involved, so there is no real campaign," he said.
Last resort
If not for the current voting law, disgruntled candidates could seek refuge with private broadcasters. But under the law, they cannot purchase advertising time on private television earlier than 15 days before the election. Olechowski and Krzaklewski had tried to start their ad campaigns earlier on Polsat, the country's largest private terrestrial TV broadcaster. But they were forced to withdraw their spots after the PKW declared their actions illegal. "All the electoral teams know very well that under the law, which was amended only this year, they cannot use private channels to broadcast their spots earlier than 15 days before elections," said Bohdan Szczesniak of PKW. "The regulation is clear."
As a further restriction, overall ad time on private TV channels cannot exceed 15% of the time awarded free of charge on TVP. "It's true that there were no limitations of this kind until this year," Szczesniak said. Jankowski doesn't agree with the PKW's ruling. "How come that in a free country I can't buy TV time to create my image?" he said. "What kind of law is this? You can't blame people for becoming less and less aware of what's going on in politics, and for a significant drop in turnout."
Meanwhile, according to Piotr Tyborowicz, sales director at TVN, negotiations with many candidates about placing ad spots 15 days before elections are underway. "The way TVP has been covering the campaign might have some influence on the number of ads," he said. "Take Krzaklewski's team, whose onetime appearance on Polsat was a kind of a protest against his unfriendly treatment at TVP. Still, I'm afraid that in many cases ads on private TV will be used as a last resort." Last week, campaign ads hadn't yet appeared on TVN and on Sept. 23, TVP was to inaugurate its free-of-charge broadcast of presidential ad campaign. While Olechowski for one has already decided to buy ad time on Polsat, Kwasniewski's team might not do it at all.
"It's not a question of money, we haven't decided yet because our candidate enjoys huge popular support; he is known and accepted," Szymczycha said. "Let's leave it to those who have the money and think that television can change history."
According to Andrzej Kirylo, spokesman for the AWS Social Movement (RS-AWS) in the Mazovian region, it might already be too late to change history. "Kwasniewski doesn't need to push hard, the only thing he has to care about is not to lose supporters and not to offend anyone," he said. "Ad spots? They won't change a thing because nobody is going to watch them, unless they are really exceptional."
Scant faith
While on his first electoral billboard Krzaklewski smiles broadly, on his second billboard, which introduces the electoral slogan "Bezpieczna przyszlosc, rodzina na swoim," (Safe Future, Secure and Established Family) he appears downbeat. Commentators have said that he has reason to be sad since his ratings remain low, and according to some polls, Krzaklewski has dropped below Olechowski.
"I am not sad, I am serious because the picture was taken only a day after my 50th birthday," Krzaklewski said on Radio Plus last week. "I can see that in my camp there is a problem with skepticism about my ability to win. But I remember skeptics in 1997 who also couldn't see beyond the ratings." In 1997, AWS drew 33.83% of voters, winning the parliamentary elections and defeating SLD with 27.13% of the vote.
"But today AWS is hurt by the burden of the four reforms (healthcare, administration, pension and education reforms started in 1999), which are important to the state but fiercely criticized by the media," Kirylo said. "One can feel that part of our electorate has flown away and you can't change it quickly. People who based their opinion about the reforms on the media have to wait until they have their own experience and then they might change their attitude."
While that might be true for the coming parliamentary elections, Krzaklewski has no time to wait. "He started his campaign two years late," Kirylo said. "He could have started creating his image a long time ago even before announcing his decision to run. He is a public person and he could have used that to improve his image in the media."
If there is a light at the end of the tunnel, most candidates say it could be in the second round of elections. Under law, the second round is a must if none of the candidates achieves 50% of votes plus one.
"As Walesa said, the second round can serve as a kind of primary for the rightist candidates," said Olszewski, leader of the Movement for the Reconstruction of Poland (ROP) as well as a presidential candidate and former prime minister. "The question is if there will be a second round."
According to Kirylo, the second round would change the color of the election considerably and could even pose a threat to the position of the sitting president. "We would deal then with two contestants and the whole situation would be much more dramatic," he said.
