The south-western city of Wroclaw has the best mayor in Poland, shows a new ranking by Newsweek Polska.
“One thing is certain about this year’s local elections – Rafal Dutkiewicz will be reelected as the mayor of Wroclaw” writes Newsweek. Dutkiewicz, who tops the newspaper’s ranking of the best Polish mayors, is a unique politician and businessman.
In the 1980s, Dutkiewicz was a member of Solidarity and the Independent Union of Students, which consisted of many of today’s top political figures, such as former Civic Platform’s deputy PM Grzegorz Schetyna, Culture Minister Bogdan Zdrojewski or deputy leader of the Law and Justice Adam Lipinski. Unlike his colleagues, who decided to make a political career on the national stage, he chose to rule locally and turned out to be a great administrator and investor.
Dutkiewicz has been extremely successful in attracting foreign investors to Wroclaw and creating new jobs, remarks the weekly. Under his rule, Wroclaw reported the biggest number of investments in its post-war history, which have included Google, LG, HP, Volvo or Nokia, and between 2003 and 2008 as many as 120,000 new jobs were created in the city.
Wroclaw Mayor Dutkiewicz also initiated the creation of the unique in Poland Wroclaw Research Centre EIT+, which integrates the scientific potential of the Lower Silesian academic environment with business.
Rafal Dutkiewicz was first elected the mayor of Wroclaw in 2002 thanks to the support of Civic Platform. Owing to his numerous achievements he was reelected to the office in 2006, gaining 85 percent of votes. Although that time Dutkiewicz ran as an independent candidate he received support from two rival political parties – Civic Platform and the Law and Justice.
Dutkiewicz is said to have a great political talent and of being able to turn everything into gold. Such abilities might eventually lead him to the Presidential Palace, many predict. For the time being Dutkiewicz will try to gain power in the Lower Silesia region.
Small towns ahead of larger cities
Surprisingly, mayors of small towns turned out to be more successful than those of major Polish cities. Warsaw, Gdansk or Katowice did not fit in the top 15 best administrated cities ranking, while the small Subcarpathian towns of Rzeszow and Krosno were second and third in the ranking, respectively.
Mayor of Rzeszow, Tadeusz Ferenc, was praised for the high number of investments in the town and low unemployment, which did not exceed 7.7 percent even in times of recession, while the mayor of Krosno was appreciated for attracting 300 companies to the town in just one year.
The ranking by Newsweek also shows that coastal towns and cities are doing very well. The mayors of Sopot, Swinoujscie or Gdynia managed to take advantage of their cities’ location and develop tourism or sea-related industry, skillfully using EU subsidies.
The eastern city of Bialystok is also a great surprise on Newsweeks’ list. In spite of being usually considered to be poor and underdeveloped, Bialystok recently topped the Eurobarometer’s ranking of the best cities to live, which it certainly owes to its mayor. Tadeusz Truskolaski, who promised to “wake up” the city in the last local elections managed to keep the promise. In the last couple of years Bialystok opened or scheduled to open numerous investments, including construction of the Science and Technology Park of Bialystok, several shopping malls and sports centres. (mg)
Source: Newsweek Polska
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