POLAND:Polish voters at home and abroad go to the polls tomorrow in a snap general election that has become a referendum on controversial prime minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski.
His Law and Justice (PiS) party came to power two years ago on a "moral revolution" mandate and launched campaigns to fight corruption and topple what it viewed as a crooked post-communist liberal elite.
But its programme was hobbled by an unstable three-way coalition with two populist parties, and the government collapsed last month, two years early, under corruption allegations.
After an election campaign filled with bitter personal attacks but little political substance, the only certainty in opinion polls is that, even after tomorrow, Poland remains a deeply divided society.
Voters in urban areas and the economically strong western regions will back the liberal, pro-business Civic Platform (PO); in final opinion polls it was just ahead of Mr Kaczynski's national conservative PiS party.
But history could repeat itself and PiS could snatch victory at the final hurdle if, as in 2005, it can mobilise its devout, older voters in rural areas.
Turnout will be a key factor tomorrow, as will a record 174,000 Polish emigrants who have registered to vote around the world, including 22,000 in Ireland. "Many people, especially young people, are worried about the direction the country is going and see they have to take things into their hands," said Pawel Swieboda, director of the DemosEuropa think tank.
Yesterday Mr Kaczynski warned supporters that a PO victory would be a triumph for a corrupt liberal elite.
"Poland must be defeated from the triumph of the lie," he told supporters in Wroclaw, saying that only a PiS win could "save Poland from corruption that is knocking on its door".
The PiS campaign against corruption is attacked by experts, who say that little has been done to tackle the roots of the problem, such as excessive bureaucracy and legal loopholes.
Instead, an elite police force stages a high-profile anti-corruption battle on prime-time tele-vision, with masked officers arresting startled suspects in their homes, most of whom are quietly released days later without charge. "Our prime minister has said publicly his government is prepared to break the law to fight corruption," said Grazyna Kopinska, anti-corruption expert of the Batory Foundation in Warsaw. "They are trying to fight corruption by instilling fear into people. This goal is sacrosanct and anyone who publicly questions the methods used is accused of being corrupt too; it's pathological," she said.
The opposition Civic Platform has promised voters tax and social reforms if elected, slashing bureaucracy, rebuilding trust in the EU and withdrawing Poland's 900 soldiers from Iraq.
As well as a small lead in opinion polls, the PO also enjoys a number of possible coalition permutations; Mr Kaczynski has alienated almost all potential allies.
But Polish pundits say it would be premature for sighs of relief in other European capitals if Mr Kaczynski is defeated tomorrow.
"PO officials could repair damaged trust in Europe," said Mr Swieboda. "But Kaczynski has set a new foreign policy doctrine with the Polish national interest playing an important role. That will continue."
The last word of the campaign will come in a letter from Polish bishops to be read out at all Masses tomorrow, an attempt to neutralise radical religious broadcaster Radio Maryja and its endorsement of PiS. "We would like to stress the fact that church has no political representation," the letter says, "and due to this fact no political party can speak in the name of church or claim that it has church's support."