Local government representatives associated with the Bezpartyjni Samorządowcy association announced at a press conference outside the Sejm on Wednesday that they would contest the parliamentary elections as… a party. “The system is forcing us to establish a party,” said Urszula Krawczyk, president of the Akademia Kobiet Skutecznych foundation and a member of Bezpartyjni Samorządowcy. “The parties have cemented the entire political environment. As the Bezpartyjni Samorządowcy association, we received more than one million votes in the 2018 elections, but in order to stand in elections to Parliament, we are forced to establish a party,” she added.
Tymoteusz Myrda, chairman of the newly established party, stressed that Poland’s electoral system has many flaws. To stand in parliamentary elections, at least 100,000 signatures must be collected, whereas in the United Kingdom, for example, just… 20 signatures are enough.
“We are running as a political party. It sounds somewhat bizarre, but the system is forcing us to do so,” said Tymoteusz Myrda. “Ninety-eight percent of Polish women and men are not members of political parties. The system is designed in such a way that it makes it difficult for them to stand in parliamentary elections. We should ask ourselves whether this is democratic in its current form,” he added.
Myrda gave two main arguments for establishing a party: first, standing as an association is practically impossible; and second, only parties receive a subsidy after exceeding the minimum threshold of 3 percent of the vote in elections.
The local government representatives also invited people to the Program Convention, which will take place on July 15 in Szeligi near Warsaw.
“We will present a program prepared by local government representatives and experts. We have worked on it continuously for half a year, but it contains proven solutions from 10 years of work for our local communities across Poland,” said Grzegorz Wysocki, deputy mayor of Warsaw’s Ochota district and a member of Bezpartyjni Samorządowcy.
The Bezpartyjni Samorządowcy association has been operating for more than 10 years. Its members are local government representatives from across Poland. In the 2018 local elections, they achieved more than 5 percent support nationwide.