The campaign trail leads abroad
Polish parties have begun campaigning in the British and Emerald Isles, courting the 600,000 Polish voters who have officially settled there. Unofficially, the number of votes up for grabs is estimated at one million. Commenting on the issue, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Andrzej Sado pointed out that, "in the Dublin constituency alone around 100,000 Poles are expected to vote. That is several times more than in the whole of the US."
The first group to launch its Britain-Ireland bid was the Left and Democrats (LiD) coalition. In the last week of September, LiD's Ryszard Kalisz held meetings with Polish lawyers and businessmen in London and later met with Polish laborers there as well.
Civic Platform (PO) was next, with party leader Donald Tusk visiting London, Dublin, Glasgow and Kirkcaldy. While PiS has yet to announce any campaign plans for Britain and Ireland, it has been rumored that Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński intends to visit Poles in the UK.
Some émigrés have expressed apathy towards the upcoming elections, but not all. "Poles in the British Isles are mostly young people. They still care about what is going on in Poland," Joanna Kamińska, a PhD student in politics at the University of London's Royal Holloway college, told WBJ.
On September 27, Poland's Ministry of Foreign Affairs approved the final list of polling stations in United Kingdom and Ireland. There will be 20 stations altogether, of which four will be set up in London alone.
For more information on the election campaign in the UK and Ireland log on to the Polish Embassy in London's website at www.london.polemb.net
