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Lech Aleksander Kaczyński (born: 18th June 1949, Warsaw) is Poland's president-elect. Together with his identical twin brother Jarosław Kaczyński, Lech Kaczyński is a leader of Prawo i Sprawiedliwość (Law and Justice) party. Kaczyński was elected the Mayor of Warsaw in 2002. His term will expire on December 23, 2005, when he is inaugurated as the president of Poland.

Presidential election result

Kaczyński won 8,257,468 votes, or 54.04% of the vote in the presidential runoff of October 23. The neo-conservative Citizens' Platform (PO) contender Donald Tusk won 7,022,319, or 45.96% of the vote.

The election took place in 25,166 precincts. 30,279,209 Poles were eligible to vote. 15,439,684 voters took part in the election, which means the voter turnout was at 50.99%. There were 159,897 invalid votes cast.

Lech Kaczyński received the official notification of his victory at 2:12 p.m. Monday, Oct. 24.

In the first round of the presidential elections on October 9, Donald Tusk won 36.33% of the vote. Kaczyński won 33.1% of the votes at the time. The race was therefore inconclusive, as neither candidate won 50% plus one vote.

Main goals of presidency

In his first public speech as president-elect, Kaczyński said his presidency would have two fundamental tasks: first, to reduce what he called "the pathological phenomena that are admittedly common around Europe and the world, but in Poland they're at dangerous levels"; and second, to reach national agreement and "bridging gaps that we've seen growing in the past 15 years."

Kaczyński later told reporters he would visit the United States in early 2006. After a brief telephone conversation with US president George W. Bush, Kaczyński said he would strengthen Poland's ties with the US. In television interview he confirmed that under certain conditions Polish troops could continue their stablisation mission in Iraq, beyond the current timetable.

Background

The Kaczyński twins are sons of Rajmund (an engineer who served as a soldier of the Armia Krajowa in World War II and a veteran of the Warsaw Uprising) and Jadwiga (a philologist at the Polish Academy of Sciences). Lech is a graduate of law and administration at the Warsaw University. In 1976 he received a PhD at the Gdańsk University. He later assumed a professor position at Gdańsk University and Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński University in Warsaw. He is married and has one daughter.

Political biography

As children the twin brothers Lech and Jarosław starred in a Polish 1962 movie The Two That Stole The Moon (Polish title O dwóch takich, co ukradli księżyc) based on a popular children's story by Kornel Makuszyński.

In the 1970s Lech Kaczyński was an activist of democratic anti-communist movement in Poland, and in August 1980 he became an adviser to the Strike Committee in Gdańsk Shipyard and the Solidarity movement. During the martial law introduced by the communists in December 1981 he was interned as an anti-socialist element.

When the Solidarity movement was legalized again in the late 1980s Lech Kaczyński was an active adviser of Lech Wałęsa and his Citizens Committee Solidarity (Komitet Obywatelski Solidarność;) in 1988, was elected Member of Parliament in June 1989, and vice-chairman of Solidarity trade union (NSZZ Solidarność). He was a leader and founder of a centrist political party: Porozumienie Centrum (Center Agreement) and the main adviser and supporter of Lech Wałęsa when he was elected the President of Poland in December 1990. Wałęsa nominated Kaczyński to be the Security Minister in the Presidential Chancellery.

Lech Kaczyński was the President of the Supreme Chamber of Control (Naczelna Izba Kontroli, NIK) from February 1992-May 1995 and later the Minister of Justice and Attorney General in Jerzy Buzek's government since June 2000 (dismissed in July 2001).

In 2001 he was the founder of Prawo i Sprawiedliwość party, and since 2002 he has been the mayor of Warsaw, the capital of Poland. As the mayor, he supported the construction of the Museum of Warsaw Uprising. He will be also remembered for refusing to stage a gay movement parade (twice), claiming the lack of neccesary documentation by organisers as the reason. His opponents called that unconsitutional in 2004 and he had been repeatedly invalidated by the Mazowieckie region voivode, or the central government representative in the region who formally supervises the mayor of Warsaw.

On 19 march 2005, he formally declared his readiness to run for president in the upcoming elections.

See also

• President of Warsaw
• Politics of Poland
• List of political parties in Poland
• List of politicians in Poland
• Polish presidential election, 2005
• Kaczyzm

External link

• http://www.lechkaczynski.pl/ - Lech Kaczyński official site (in Polish, English, French, German and Spanish).
• Strong and Moral State: Lech Kaczynski Speaks on His Presidential Plans
• Lech Kaczynski – The Head of the Capital Ready to Head the State

• 1949 births
• Presidents of Poland
• Identical twins
• Mayors
• Polish actors
• Polish politicians