President Bronislaw Komorowski will announce the date of parliamentary elections in early March, minister at the president’s office, Slawomir Nowak told Polish Radio this morning.

He also floated the idea that the general election in Poland could be held over two days, as this “will increase participation. I believe civic participation is very important to the democratic process”.

Nowak said that the timing of the election - which the ruling Civic Platform party wants on 23 October this year - is very important to President Komorowski as he doesn’t want the campaign to clash with important events this year.

Poland hosts the six-month EU presidency starting 1 July.

Grzegorz Napieralski, leader of the Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) told Polish Radio earlier today that his party prefers early elections in the Spring. In his opinion “an election campaign would not serve the EU presidency well”.

Civic Platform has argued that should a new government or coalition take power shortly before the EU presidency it not have time to prepare for such a huge event. (pg)