Parties running in Poland’s Sunday parliamentary election hold final campaign rallies

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Party leaders competing in Poland’s upcoming key parliamentary elections are holding their final campaign rallies Friday in hopes of attracting new voters as opinion polls suggest a close race.

The election Sunday will decide whether the ruling conservative, Euro-skeptic Law and Justice party will win a third straight term or whether the liberal, pro-European Civic Coalition and its partners will take power seeking to improve Poland’s democratic standards and international standing.

Law and Justice leader, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who is Poland’s de-facto ruler, is meeting voters in southeastern Poland, where his party has a small edge over the opposition, and his closing rally is to be held in the picturesque town of Sandomierz, the location of a popular TV series “The Reverend Mateusz,” about an investigative priest.

Though his hometown is Warsaw, Kaczynski is running from the southern city of Kielce, where he can count on much larger backing than in the capital, where his archrival, Civic Coalition leader Donald Tusk is running. Voters in large cities have backed Tusk’s party in recent votes.

Tusk’s final campaign rally is being held in Pruszkow, near Warsaw.

Other parties are also closing their campaigns with a number of events across the country.

From midnight Friday, electoral silence begins, meaning no campaigning and no publishing of opinion polls, in order to give the voters time to weigh their decision.

Polls suggest Law and Justice will win the most votes but will lose its current narrow parliament majority and with it the possibility to rule singlehandedly.

With some 8% of eligible voters still undecided, statements from the leaders at the rallies on Friday could decide the nation’s immediate future.