FILE PHOTO: A picture of historian Karol Nawrocki, announced as Poland's main opposition party Law and Justice (PiS) candidate for a presidential election in 2025, is displayed during a party convention, in Krakow, Poland November 24, 2024. Jakub Wlodek/Agencja Wyborcza.pl/via REUTERS/File Photo
WARSAW (Reuters) - Poland will hold the first round of a presidential election on May 18, the parliament speaker said on Wednesday, setting the scene for a vote that will be crucial for the pro-European government's hopes of implementing its agenda.
Prime Minister Donald Tusk's ruling coalition came to power vowing to undo the previous Law and Justice (PiS) government's judicial reforms which critics said undermined the rule of law.
However, its efforts have been hampered by PiS ally President Andrzej Duda, who has the power to veto laws. Duda's term in office ends this year, but if the candidate backed by PiS wins the deadlock would be set to continue.
Critics of PiS, including the European Union, say the party politicised the processes of appointing and disciplining judges while it was in power. PiS says its reforms were necessary to remove a residue of communist influence in the judicial system.
The 2025 election will pit the candidate of Tusk's Civic Coalition (KO), liberal Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski, against historian Karol Nawrocki, the conservative head of Poland's Institute of National Remembrance who is backed by PiS.
If no candidate scores more than 50% in the first round a second round run-off will be held on June 1.
The election campaign will take place during Poland's six-month presidency of the European Union, during which Warsaw will focus on the need to boost Europe's defence capabilities, an issue on which all sides of the NATO-member country's political spectrum are in agreement.
Trzaskowski, who was narrowly beaten by Duda in the 2020 election, is ahead in the polls and the government hopes his progressive credentials will help the party capitalise on the anti-PiS anger among young voters that propelled it to power.
However, Nawrocki has been gaining ground on the back of a campaign that has mixed images of him working out in the boxing gym and jogging with a focus on traditional Catholic values and patriotism.
Some political commentators have drawn parallels with the 2015 campaign, when Duda came from relative obscurity to win after cultivating a down-to-earth image that PiS contrasted with what it said was the elitism of liberals.
(Reporting by Kuba Stezycki, Alan Charlish, Pawel Florkiewicz; Editing by Alison Williams)
