Poland’s PiS Boosts Populist Hopes with EU Election Win

Poland's ruling Law and Justice party (PiS) defied exit polls to secure a decisive victory in European parliamentary elections, dashing early hopes among pro-EU opposition candidates.

In the end, more than 45 per cent of votes went to the nationalist, eurosceptic PiS, which has long been at loggerheads with Brussels over judicial independence and allegations of authoritarianism.

Turnout was 45.6 per cent, a record for EU elections in Poland.

The victory is a boon for eurosceptic populists across Europe who are hoping to forge a more unified nationalist opposition to the centrist parties that have dominated EU politics for decades.

In Poland, the European Coalition (KE) came in second with just over 38 per cent while the socially liberal Wiosna (Spring) party got around six per cent, lower than expected.

The far-right Konfederacja alliance failed to pass the 5 per cent electoral threshold needed to send MEPs to Brussels, despite early indications from exit polls that it might.

The results means that PiS gets 23 seats in the European Parliament, where they sit in the European Conservatives and Reformists political group.

KE has 21 seats, which are split between the centre-right European People's Party and the centre-left Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats.

Here are some reactions from analysts on the results in Poland.

Piotr Buras, head of Warsaw office of the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR)

"It's important to mention that 45 per cent is the best result any party in Poland has ever got in any elections since 1989. It's a huge success for PiS and quite unexpected, especially the scope of the victory.

"We all expected these would be tight elections, and this...