Speaking to Polish Radio Three, Marek Sawicki said that "no one from PiS has talked to me about a possible coalition."
Tomasz Gzell/PAP

An MP from the agrarian Polish People’s Party (PSL) said in a radio interview on Thursday that no one from the incumbent Law and Justice (PiS) party has approached him to discuss his party’s joining PiS as a coalition partner.

The PSL has been touted in some quarters as a possible coalition partner for PiS. The governing party, having fallen well short of a parliamentary majority in October’s general election, needs an ally if it is to have any chance of remaining in office for a third consecutive term.

But PSL has so far rebuffed talk of a possible deal with PiS, vowing, instead, to unseat PiS and form their own coalition government.

Speaking to Polish Radio Three, Marek Sawicki said that “no one from PiS has talked to me about a possible coalition.”

“Just before entering the studio, I met PSL leader Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz and he also told me that he had not received any signals from that side,” he added.

“I think this is just a narrative for the purpose of entrusting Prime Minister Morawiecki with the function of creating a new government,” said Sawicki. “I’m convinced that the prime minister will very quickly give up on this proposal and this mission, because Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, firstly, knows how to count.”

Andrzej Duda, the Polish president, has given Morawiecki the first shot of forming the next government despite PiS’s lack of seats in the lower house of parliament.

On Monday evening, Sawicki was nominated as senior speaker of the new Polish parliament by Duda.

The senior speaker presides over the first sessions of the new lower house of parliament after a general election until a new speaker is elected by the house.