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| - Holding Poland's presidential election on May 10 during coronavirus pandemic restrictions would amount to a "coup d'etat" by the ruling party, opposition candidate Malgorzata Kidawa-Blonska said Saturday. There has been a chorus of demands for the vote to be postponed from across Polish society -- including even the governing Law and Justice (PiS) party's own health minister. However PiS, which backs President Andrzej Duda for re-election, refuses to change the date even as restrictions it has imposed to fight the pandemic means the vote will be via postal ballot. It also means traditional campaigning will not be possible -- likely an advantage for Duda, who is well ahead in opinion polls. If held on May 10, the election will be "a coup d'etat not only against our democracy but also against the life and health of Poles," Kidawa-Blonska told the Fakt newspaper in a video posted Saturday. "This election will not be democratic and the result is fixed in advance. We cannot take part or encourage Poles to take part in this farce," she said. "This election must not go ahead on May 10." Asked about her falling opinion poll ratings, Kidawa-Blonska said they reflected the fact that people "did not want an election now." Meanwhile former PiS premier Beata Szydlo, who heads Duda's campaign, said she believed the vote should go ahead on May 10 "because Poland needs it." Poles "must feel in these difficult times that the political situation is stable while politicians should look after the economy, jobs and the fight against the coronavirus," she told the Gazeta Polska Codziennie newspaper. Health Minister Lukasz Szumowski, who is also a cardiologist, said Friday that delaying the poll until 2022 would be "the only safe option." However, such a delay would require a change to the constitution -- which the opposition rules out, calling instead for a state of emergency, in turn rejected by the ruling conservatives. via/avz/bmm/dl
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