Walesa Offers to Serve as Both Prime Minister and President
Poland’s President Lech Walesa, moving to create a government capable of decisive economic reform after elections that resulted in a splintered Parliament, proposed Tuesday that he become his own prime minister.
Walesa said he expects to form a coalition made up of groups rooted in the Solidarity trade union movement, preferably with himself as prime minister.
An alternative, he said, is a government of the seven parties that won the greatest number of votes. That would include the former Communists, who placed second with about 11% of the votes from Sunday’s elections.
Walesa, founder of the Solidarity movement in 1980, was elected president last December. He had hoped that the parliamentary vote would result in a strong government capable of smoothly transforming Poland’s economy.
The constitution requires Walesa to appoint a new prime minister who has to be approved by the 460-seat Sejm, or lower house of Parliament.
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