Mateusz Morawiecki: an unconventional 'Polish Dreamer'

Mateusz Morawiecki, the son of an anti-communist dissident who became a successful banker and later Poland’s finance minister, made a name for himself by taking on tax evasion and bolstering the welfare state.

Those moves have paved his way for his right wing Law and Justice (PiS) party to propose him as prime minister on Thursday, replacing Beata Szydlo as the government focuses on the economy in the second half of its four-year term.

At 49, the youthful-looking Morawiecki is lauded by many for giving poorer Poles a hand up, but critics accuse him of wasting a golden opportunity offered by a strong economy to consolidate public finances.

He has a cosmopolitan pedigree while strongly asserting his patriotism, and makes no secret of his desire to banish all traces of Poland’s communist past from public life.

Last month Morawiecki revealed that for the “last 40 years” he had been “dreaming” about demolishing the Palace of Culture and Science, a gargantuan 230-metre (750-foot) socialist-realist tower built in heart of Warsaw during the 1950s, on orders of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin.

Morawiecki’s views gel with the “de-communisation” drive that has helped Poland’s governing Law and Justice (PiS) push through several contested measures, including justice reforms which the EU has called a “systemic threat” to the rule of law.