Official results show SLD-UP falls just short of overall Sejm majority

The official election results announced yesterday have confirmed that the left-wing coalition of the Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) and Labor Union (UP) fell just short of achieving an overall majority in the Sejm. According to an electoral committee announcement, the coalition won 41% of the popular vote, giving it 216 seats in the lower house, 15 short of an overall majority. It is still unclear whether SLD leader Leszek Miller will decide in favor of forming a coalition with one of the other parties in the Sejm, or opt to rule as a minority government. Yesterday morning in an interview on TVN 24, Miller said that he is not enthusiastic about the idea of minority government. The SLD fared much better in the election to the upper house, the Senate, winning 75 seats, or three fourths of the total. Voter turnout averaged 46.29% across the country. Leading the way was Warsaw, where 56.1% of eligible voters cast their ballots, followed by Poznan, where the figure was 52.7%. The politician who won the largest number of votes was Miller himself, who gained the support of 145,637 voters in his constituency of Lodz and the surrounding areas. (Rzeczpospolita, p. A1; Gazeta Wyborcza, p. 1; Zycie, p. 1) P.W.