“The platform has a glass ceiling above it. Neither the left nor the Catholic voters trust her. Donald Tusk is doing a great job traveling around the country, meeting people, but he is not showing up in the polls, says Prof. Mieczysław Ryba, historian, lecturer at the Catholic University of Lublin.
wPolityce.pl: “You are Catholic, you want to follow the Decalogue, you believe in the fundamental principles of Christianity, do you understand Jesus Christ? Then you cannot vote for PiS or the Confederation, Donald Tusk said at one of the meetings. The new face of PO?
Prof. Mieczyslaw Ryba (KUL): In a programmatic sense, the leader of the PO has an incredibly radical pro-abortion agenda. And let us not forget that the issue of the defense of life is one of the fundamental moral issues of the Church’s teaching. Tusk also talks more and more about gay relationships and taking religion classes at school. This has nothing to do with this politician’s declared Catholicism. The former prime minister creates a kind of pseudo-theology, according to which we should not be guided by the instructions of the church, but by certain emotions. It should not be forgotten that Donald Tusk’s electorate includes Catholics. Therefore, the PO’s offer should be an offer for everyone, but it cannot be. This was clearly visible, for example, in the vote on the resolution in defense of St. John Paul II.
Only one KO MP voted for the resolution.
On the other hand, they did not vote against it, as they know it would be incompatible with the views of much of their electorate. So they didn’t know what to do with it. They are radicalizing because they want to take over the New Left electorate, and yet they still have the old electorate, which has not gone through such a revolutionary process. PO politicians expected that everything had changed in Poland with the Women’s Strike, hence the famous photos of Donald Tusk with Marta Lempart. However, this is not true. Only part of the population has radicalised. A significant portion of the people remain faithful to the teachings of the Church, and among them are PO voters. They seem quite surprised by the turnaround of the party they support.
What happened to the Civic Platform, which referred to the thoughts of John Paul II in its ideological statement in 2001?
The PO does not want competition from the opposition and therefore hopes to accommodate the New Left. Moreover, some politicians of the PO hope more for a return to power with the sanctions coming from Brussels than with the mobilization of their own electorate.
Just a few years ago, the slogan of the “conservative anchor” was cast…
This proves the lack of ideology of this formation. When “anchors” are thrown in all directions – right and left, no one takes it seriously. This is a purely cyclical operation. The PO is a party that has no opinion of its own on the most fundamental ideological issues. The platform has a glass ceiling above it. Neither the left nor the Catholic voters trust her. Donald Tusk does a great job traveling around the country, meeting people, but he’s not in the polls.
Perhaps a change in leadership position would change the situation? Would Rafał Trzaskowski make a difference by making PO a strictly left-liberal party?
I don’t think there is much difference between Trzaskowski and Tusk. Some time ago it could be said that the mayor of Warsaw was pro-LGBT and the chairman of the PO was not. Now, however, it seems that both politicians are on an equal footing. Of course a change of frontman always gives a certain freshness. Suffice it to mention the replacement of Małgorzata Kidawa-Błońska by Rafał Trzaskowski. Except that the PO candidate shuffled around the bottom, and presidential elections have their own specificity – the entire anti-PiS camp voted against Andrzej Duda. Does this regulation also apply in this case? Hard to say. However, these are ordinary parliamentary elections. It’s hard to say if Rafał Trzaskowski would be such an added value, maybe he is. However, this does not change the ideological profile of Platforma Obywatelska, which would remain the same party. However, it’s worth noting that Donald Tusk hates being a leader.
Can the Civic Platform still be defined as a Christian Democratic party?
Only in the sense that the CDU is Christian Democratic. It supports all revolutionary activities and has a Christian Democratic character in its name. It is true that the name of the PO does not stand for Christian Democracy, but according to the Catholic Reformed Church it is Christian Democracy of a revolutionary type, which is rather serious – it has nothing to do with Christian Democracy.
Thank you for the conversation.
Alexander Majewski spoke
Source: wPolityce