By Marcin Goclowski and Pawel Florkiewicz
WARSAW (Reuters) – Poland’s ruling nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) party was in the lead in Sunday’s parliamentary election with 49.3% of votes, according to partial official results calculated on the basis of 42% of the constituencies and published early on Monday.
The country’s biggest opposition grouping, the Civic Coalition, is seen coming second with 22.3% support, followed by the leftist alliance, The Left, with 10.9%. The bloc of agrarian PSL and anti-system Kukiz’15 was at 9.8% while the far-right Confederation would get 6.6%.
An overall majority in the lower house of parliament would allow PiS to continue its reforms of the justice system, media and cultural institutions in its second four-year term.
The reforms have been criticized by Brussels. Poland is the biggest post-communist country-member of the European Union.
The anti-PiS opposition received more than 50% of votes combined, but the complicated Polish election system gives a bonus for the biggest grouping effectively meaning that the PiS gets the biggest number of seats, remaining in power.
Further partial official results are expected later on Monday.
The results of the vote to the upper house of parliament, the Senate, that consists of 100 deputies, were still unclear. The Senate has the power to amend and delay lower house legislation, and block changes to the constitution.
