President hints early elections may be necessary to break political crisis

President Kwasniewski stated on Friday, "If it turned out that Parliament is not in a position to fulfill its duties I believe that the Parliamentary majority would assume the responsibility of proposing early elections." At the same time Prime Minister Leszek Miller warned that if the Polish Peasants Party (PSL) supports the motion to dismiss the Sejm Speaker, Marek Borowski, the coalition will cease to exist. The PSL leadership backed down announcing that its deputies will not vote to dismiss Borowski. Some PSL parliamentaries were unhappy with this, but the party leadership threatened rebellious MP's that they would be thrown out of the club if they broke ranks. The president has the right to dissolve Parliament if it is unable to create a government, or if it fails to produce a budget by the statutory deadline. The Sejm's Presidium decided that Gabriel Janowski from the Polish Family League (LPR) will receive only half of his salary as a deputy for four months as a result of his protests on Friday. (Gazeta Wyborcza, Oct. 19-20; p. 1) A.Z.