Polish presidential election, 2005

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Presidential elections were held in Poland on October 9 and October 23, 2005. The outgoing President of Poland, Aleksander Kwaśniewski, had served two five-year terms and was unable to stand for a third term.

Two center-right candidates, Donald Tusk, chairman of the Civic Platform party (PO), and Lech Kaczyński, leader of the Law and Justice party (PiS) and mayor of Warsaw, led the poll in the first round, as was widely expected. As neither received 50 percent of the vote, a second round was held on 23 October. In this round, Kaczyński defeated Tusk, polling 54.04 percent of the vote.

Although both leading candidates came from the center-right, and their two parties had planned to form a coalition government following the legislative elections on 25 September, there were important differences between Tusk and Kaczyński. Tusk is considered somewhat more socially and economically liberal, favoring more rapid European integration and a free-market economy. Kaczyński is more socially conservative, in the tradition of post-Communist Poland's first President, Lech Wałęsa, and is more suspicious towards the European Union. Such differences led to the failure of PiS-PO coalition talks in late October.

Voters turnout in the first round was quite low with only 49.6 percent of all eligible voters casting their votes.

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Summary of 9 October 2005 Polish Presidential **election results**
Candidates and nominating parties	Votes 1st round	%	Votes 2nd round	%
Donald Franciszek Tusk - Civic Platform	5,429,666	36.3	7,022,319	45.96
Lech Aleksander Kaczyński - Law and Justice	4,947,927	33.1	8,257,468	54.04
Andrzej Zbigniew Lepper - Self-Defense of the Republic of Poland	2,259,094	15.1	-	-
Marek Stefan Borowski - Social Democracy of Poland	1,544,642	10.3	-	-
Jarosław Kalinowski - Polish Peasant Party	269,316	1.8	-	-
Janusz Ryszard Korwin-Mikke - Janusz Korwin-Mikke Platform	214,116	1.4	-	-
Henryka Teodora Bochniarz - Democratic Party	188,598	1.3	-	-
Liwiusz Marian Ilasz	31,691	0.2	-	-
Stanisław Tymiński - All-Polish Citizens Coalition	23,545	0.2	-	-
Leszek Henryk Bubel - Polish National Party	18,828	0.1	-	-
Jan Pyszko - Organization of the Polish Nation - Polish League	10,371	0.1	-	-
Adam Andrzej Słomka - The Polish Confederation-Freedom and the Work	8,895	0.1	-	-
Total (turnout 49.7 %)	15,046,350	100

Włodzimierz Cimoszewicz, the candidate of the Alliance of the Democratic Left, which was the governing party before the legislative election withdrew from the race on September 14. At the time he withdrew he was third in the polls, still having the most chances to get to the second round (besides Kaczyński and Tusk).

Other candidates, who withdrew from the elections, but initially have signed to, were Zbigniew Religa and Maciej Giertych. Daniel Tomasz Podrzycki, who have also signed, died in an accident before the elections.

There were 10 persons who registered themselves in election procedure, but failed to gather 100 000 support signatures: Arnold Buzdygan, Stanisław Ceberek, Gabriel Janowski, Jan Antoni Kiełb, Waldemar Janusz Kossakowski, Marian Romuald Rembelski, Zbigniew Roliński, Sławomir Salomon, Maria Szyszkowska, Bolesław Tejkowski.