No clear alternative

by Chris Mularczyk

Many moons ago when she was attacked for her monetarist policies, Margaret Thatcher kept repeating "there is no alternative." It stuck. The advocates and apologists for the present Polish administration are engaged in a similar exercise today. "There is no alternative to Leszek Miller and the SLD," we are told day and night.

It is true that there is no clear alternative government waiting in the wings. The PiS and PO disagree over economic policy and much else. The PSL is focused purely on rural issues such as direct payments and biofuels. Samoobrona and the LPR are intrinsically antisystem parties for which forming a government would come as a great shock.

It is also true that the president has failed on two accounts. He has failed to create an alternative political force to Miller's SLD and has been unable to oust him within the SLD. If the ousting is to going to be done, it will have to come from the ranks of the republican guard of the SLD itself.

When Thatcher coined her T.I.N.A. phrase, she was referring to policy and direction. In the case of Miller and the SLD, it just refers to a group of people. Since there is no direction or policy to speak of, talking of alternatives here is rather redundant.

The sight of a government arguing internally over its economic policy halfway into its term of office is pitiful. There is no agreement between the two key economic ministers (Jerzy Hausner and Grzegorz Kołodko) on such fundamental issues as the size of the budget deficit, levels of company taxation and indexation of pensions and benefits.

The Hausner package is completely at odds with Kołodko's objectives. It would mean a higher budget deficit and therefore no prospect of the country joining the euro-zone in 2007. Both ministers are being unrealistic. Kołodko knows full well that indexation is a constitutional matter that cannot be resolved in this Sejm. Hausner knows full well that continuing indexation equals continued high costs of social security, making reform of public finances virtually impossible.

The political call, agreed between the president and the prime minister, for the election to be brought forward to June 2004 may not be worth the paper it is not written on. Nevertheless, the result is that the country has effectively been plunged into a general election campaign lasting 14 months, starting even before the European Union referendum is out of the way. In such a political climate, the reform of public finances is impossible.

Another goal announced by both president and premier - that of getting the nation prepared for EU accession - is yet another mirage. Finland had 8,000 people working on its accession. Poland, a much larger country, has only a few hundred. The favorable package negotiated for our rural areas in Copenhagen now cannot be sold because the people who were to do the selling (PSL) are no longer inside the government. If we make it into the EU, it will be despite and not because of this government.

We are destined to join the EU as the country with the highest number of unemployed, the highest number of people employed in agriculture and one of the lowest rates of economic growth. If we add to this the very high levels of corruption, lack of knowledge of foreign languages and a virtually broken-down judicial system, the early years of membership look grizzly.

It should not be forgotten that the country is not entering the same EU as was joined by the southern Europeans in the eighties. Comparisons with the Swedes, Austrians and Finns in the nineties are not worth making. It is now a Europe with a single market and one too strapped for cash to continue to pay for extravagant charity in the shape of structural funds and the common agricultural policy. The potential penalties for failing to meet obligations are laid out in the accession treaty. If we do not meet the standards laid down, our access to markets may be limited.

The T.I.N.A. scenario is profoundly depressing. It means months of aimless drifting and jockeying for position before the general election. It implies no meaningful reform of public finances. It means trying to cash in on the emotional feel-good factor linked with accession rather than trying to get ready for the challenges accession actually brings.

The SLD is obviously planning to run a campaign on the theme "It's us or chaos." We already have the chaos, thank you very much.

Let us hope that the next 14 months are used by at least some on the opposition to bring forward a political project that could deliver an alternative government in the next Sejm. Unfortunately, the odds on this are about as long as those on me becoming a Luxembourg tram driver. (The last trams in Luxembourg were phased out 30 years ago.)