Dividing, but not conquering
What they hoped to achieve through the media circus is less clear. The politicians used the stage to slam the Kaczyński government, saying the government had brought "second-class democracy" to Poland. But certainly the Polish public is already well aware of both Kwaniewski's and Wałęsa's opposition to the current government.
Kwaniewski has for some weeks been preparing the ground for a return to politics, and perhaps was hoping to drum up some public support for a run for office. But he made no such announcement. We are left to wonder what it was all for.
Were the politicians aiming to dampen political support for the Kaczyńskis? That hardly seems necessary, as the opposition is maintaining its lead in the opinion polls, and those sympathetic to PiS could hardly be convinced by a former communist (Kwaniewski) or a man whom they see as having turned his back on their cause (Wałęsa).
What the conference did achieve was a rise in volume of the already shrill discourse which pervades the Polish political scene. Though the left pines for Kwaniewski's comeback, and Wałęsa seems to pine for his own, both politicians' time has passed. Kwaniewski is too divisive, Wałęsa too ham-handed. Those who oppose the Kaczyńskis are right to be disappointed in the impotence of the current opposition, but reintroducing past leaders, with all of their political baggage, is not the solution. The anti-Kaczyński movement needs a uniting figure, a fresh face, not divisive personages from the past who are sure only to deepen the already deep divisions in Polish politics. l
