Going, going
Gone? One of the disadvantages of writing a political column during a crisis, four days before newsstand delivery is that anything can happen and if it can, it will. It also means four days of nail biting while waiting to see if what one predicted turned out to be correct, or whether today's insights will be fodder for the next "Hackwatch" column in Private Eye. But although the final outcome is unpredictable, what is certain is that it will be the result not only of the negotiations between the Freedom Union (UW) and Solidarity Election Action (AWS), but also the internal maneuverings of competing factions within those two parties.
Take the UW. Although the party likes to present itself as a united force under the leadership of a powerful chairman, Leszek Balcerowicz, in fact it is internally riven with dissent over what tactics to pursue during the current crisis. An example of this came last week, when in a radio program Balcerowicz let slip that he would not mind if Prime Minister Jerzy Buzek refused to accept the resignation of the UW ministers in order to "give talks a chance." That infuriated senior members of the UW, many of whom are determined to let the AWS ship sink on its own, and see no sense in any attempts to resuscitate the coalition. Who in the UW stands on what side of the issue cuts across the previous internal cleavage within the party between the so-called "liberals" linked to Balcerowicz and the more social-democratic old guard, whose symbolic figurehead remains former Prime Minister Tadeusz Mazowiecki. Politicians linked with both camps have been taking either a hard or soft line towards AWS. Contrast the violent attacks of Aleksander Smolar, a leading UW adviser, on AWS and Buzek, with the conciliatory statements of economic guru Waldemar Kuczynski or the leading liberal, Donald Tusk.
That explains a great deal of the UW's toing and froing over the last week, once seemingly determined to ditch AWS, now engaged in fevered coalition negotiations, and is also reflected in the bizarre spectacle of UW ministers who tendered their resignations on Monday attending Tuesday's cabinet meeting en masse. That seeming vacillation is more a reflection of a barely concealed internal struggle than a function of any sophisticated game plan being implemented.
But of course, the key to the success or failure of the coalition talks rests very much in the hands of AWS, where again competing factions are putting forward different strategies. There remains a small but influential faction of AWS parliamentarians who are quite prepared to accept a minority government of AWS only, with perhaps a hapless Buzek still at the helm. The theory is that once rid of the UW, AWS will be free to lurch to the right and recover its past electorate through a determined dose of radical rhetoric. Some AWS MPs even believe that an option would be for AWS to try to reach agreement with the Polish Peasants Party (PSL) and other right wing grouplets in parliament that over the last two years have been ejected from AWS.
But the vast majority of AWS MPs recognize that a minority government would be suicidal and that a renewed alliance with the UW is the only sensible option. Here again, however, divisions begin. Some AWS MPs, especially those grouped in the Conservative-Peasants Party (SKL) faction, are prepared to go to great lengths to accommodate the UW's negotiating demands, whilst others, mainly in the Christian-National Union wing (ZChN), believe in a "no compromise" negotiating strategy. Somewhere in the middle sits AWS leader Marian Krzaklewski, who recognizes that failure to renew the coalition will mean the end of AWS and his own political career, and who must ensure that whatever agreement is hammered out with the UW is acceptable to all the internal AWS factions.
Few doubt that the only way to secure the latter is for Krzaklewski himself to step forward as the next prime minister. Many now recognize that it was the failure of Krzaklewski to become prime minister in 1997, and instead pursue a tactic of running the government from the back seat, that is the source of current troubles. Now, it seems, Krzaklewski has come to understand this himself. Yet here again, dilemmas commence. On the one hand, in becoming prime minister, Krzaklewski himself would be forced to choose between the premiership, and giving up either his presidential campaign, or even the chairmanship of the Solidarity trade union as well. As for the UW, although even six months ago many of its leaders were urging him to become prime minister, now few of them are able to accept as prime minister a man who in recent weeks and days they have started to perceive as untrustworthy and even incompetent.
Whatever the outcome, it will be a function of the complex interplay of all these competing factions and forces between the coalition partners and within them. One thing is clear: the answer as to "what next?" will not be long in coming this time.
Marek Matraszek is the Warsaw Director of CEC Government Relations. He can be e-mailed on director@cec.com.pl
