WARSAW, Oct. 15 Voting has begun in Poland for the parliamentary elections and a national referendum.
Polling stations opened at 7:00 local time (8:00 Moscow time) and will close at 21:00 (22:00 Moscow time). Only after this will the first exit poll data be announced. A total of 31,497 voting stations have been created, including 417 abroad and eight on ships.
Polish citizens will elect 460 members of the Sejm, the lower house of parliament, and 100 members of the Senate, the upper house.
Deputies of the Sejm are elected according to party lists proportionally in 41 multi-member constituencies. In each, from seven to 20 mandates are played. According to the calculations of the State Election Commission, record competition was recorded in constituency No. 33 in the city of Kielce — 272 candidates are vying for 16 seats.
Seats in the Sejm are allocated using the D'Hondt method. The electoral threshold is five percent for parties and eight percent for coalitions. Senators are elected from 100 single-member districts.
Traditionally, elections to the Sejm are considered more important, since it is the lower house of parliament that participates in the formation of the government and controls its work.
In addition, voters will answer referendum questions regarding the retirement age, the privatization of state property, the reception of illegal migrants from other EU countries and the fence on the border with Belarus.
According to the State Election Commission, 29,091,533 voters are eligible to vote. This is less than in the 2019 parliamentary elections — then there were 30,111,281 voters.
This time almost 90 political forces will compete for parliamentary seats, which is significantly more than in the previous elections four years ago.
The ruling Law and Justice party (PiS), led by Jaroslaw Kaczynski, intends to remain in power. According to one of the latest surveys conducted by the authoritative laboratory United Surveys, a total of five political forces will be included in the Sejm: 33.8 percent of respondents are ready to vote for PiS, 28.1 percent are ready to vote for the opposition “Civil Coalition”, the “Left” association can get 10 .2 percent, the centrist association «Third Way» — 9.4 percent, and the coalition of nationalists and Eurosceptics «Confederation» — 8.4 percent of the vote.