Bronislaw Komorowski

As polling stations closed at 20.00 CET, Sunday, in the first round of Poland’s presidential elections exit polls suggest Bronislaw Komorowski has won between 40 to 45.7 percent of the vote – not enough to take him straight into the Presidential Palace.

The exit poll for TVN puts Komorowski on 45.7, Jaroslaw Kaczynski on 33.2, with Grzegorz Napieralski on 13 percent.

Turnout was 52.3 percent.

The poll for public broadcaster TVP, however, puts Komorowski on 40 percent, just five percent ahead of Kaczynski on 35 percent.

If the exit poll translates into actual votes cast then the two candidates will go into a head-to-head second round run off on July 4 to decide who will replace the late Lech Kaczynski – Jarolsaw’s twin brother – who died in the Smolensk plane disaster of April 10.

A major surprise is that deputy prime minister Waldemar Pawlak failed to come in fourth place, with the TVN exit poll giving him just 1.6 percent. Fourth place was taken in both TVN and TVP polls by Janusz Korwin Mikke on between 2.3 and 3 percent.

Voting in Polish Embassy in Brussels, photo: K.Skieterska

The exit poll results suggest a movement in the last few days towards Kaczynski and Napieralski and away from Komrowski. Which way left wing Napieralski recommends his support vote in the second round puts him in the king makers position, potentially.

Thenews.pl |