Poland’s Deputy Prime Minister Jaroslaw Gowin, on Monday tendered his resignation letter after failing to convince the governing majority to postpone the May 10 presidential election in view of coronavirus.
“I believe that the election should be postponed. The May 10 date is out of the question,” Gowin said.
The politician announced he would vote against a Bill proposed by the governing Law and Justice (PiS) party, which would introduce postal voting as the sole way of participating in the upcoming presidential ballot.
Shortly after Gowin’s announcement, PiS failed to secure the votes to put that bill on parliament’s agenda for Monday.
Gowin announced he would continue his efforts to postpone the presidential ballot.
His proposal is to extend the current term of office of President Andrzej Duda by two years through a constitutional amendment with a presidential election afterward.
The politician rejected, in turn, the idea of introducing a state of natural disaster in the country, a solution favoured by opposition lawmakers. Introducing such a state would also result in postponing the election.
For the past three weeks now, public life in Poland had been drastically restricted by measures put in place to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus.
As of Monday, Poland had confirmed 4,201 cases of the novel coronavirus, with 98 fatalities.
Sunday marked the biggest daily increase in the number of cases so far, with 475 new cases and 15 fatalities.(dpa/NAN)