The Polish parliament, elected in September, endorsed a minority cabinet of the Law and Justice Party (PiS). (Duetsche Welle’s program, Journal, via LinkTV.)
This party also controls the presidency, having seen its candidate, Lech Kaczynski, to victory in the presidential runoff last month, culminating Poland’s season of elections. Law and Justice had been expected to form a majority coalition with Civic Platform, the party whose candidate was the runner-up in the presidential election. But they were unable to agree, so the minority government will govern with the backing of several small parties. It takes a “constructive” no confidence vote to replace a cabinet (i.e. a majority has to vote in a replacement) and the presidency is fairly powerful. So it should be a fairly stable government, despite the considerable fragmentation of the parliament.
