Tusk was officially designated as Prime Minister on November 9 2007 and took office on November 16. His cabinet won the vote of confidence in the Sejm on November 24 2007.

Politics

Tusk was one of several vice-speakers of the Sejm (2001-2005), the lower house of the Polish parliament. Prior to co-founding Civic Platform in 2001, he was a prominent member of the Liberal Democratic Congress (Kongres Liberalno-Demokratyczny) and the Freedom Union (Unia Wolności). He quit the Freedom Union after he failed to win the party's chairmanship in a race against Bronisław Geremek.

Tusk's political position combines strong support of a free market economy with little government interference, with conservatism. Tusk has been a member of the Sejm since 2004.

Tusk represented the constituencies of Gdynia-Słupsk (2001-2005) and Gdańsk (2005-2007). As of 2007 he is MP for Warsaw. In 2005, the Civic Platform nominated him as their candidate for the 2005 presidential election. He was defeated in the second round by a margin of 46:54 by Lech Kaczyński.

Biography

Education

Tusk graduated from the Mikołaj Kopernik (Nicolaus Copernicus) High School in Gdansk in 1976. He then enrolled as a student of history at the University of Gdansk, from which he graduated in 1980 with an MA thesis on Józef Piłsudski.

Oppositional activity in the People's Republic of Poland (PRL)

Early on he engaged in oppositional activity against the communist regime. As a student of history at the University of Gdansk he participated in creating the Student Committee of Solidarity, which was founded in reaction to the murder of Stanislaw Pyjas by the Security Service (communist secret police) in Krakow. He also cooperated with Bogdan Borusewicz, one of the leaders of Polish Solidarity. He was the originator and one of the first leaders of the Independent Polish Students' Association (laster NZS). Several months later he became the head of "Solidarity" at Sea Publishing House. He was thrown out of the state firm due to his oppositional activity. Tusk engaged in collaborative efforts for seven years with Maciej Plazynski.

Political activity after the fall of communism

Donald Tusk was one of the founders of the Liberal Democratic Congress (Kongres Liberalno-Demokratyczny). In 1991 he became the chairman of the KLD, which in the autumn elections won 37 mandates in the lower house. Tusk became one of the members of the Polish Parliament.

During a government crisis in 1992, when the Minister of Internal Matters Antoni Macierewicz unveiled secret collaborators of communist Służba Bezpieczeństwa, Tusk supported a vote of no-confidence against the Olszewski's government. His, and seven other parties appointed Hanna Suchocka as prime minister of Poland.

After the fall of Hanna Suchocka's government in 1993, his party did not cross the 5 percent threshold necessary to enter parliament. In April 1994 Tusk became one of the vice-chairmen of the Freedom Union (Unia Wolnosci), formed by a merger of the KLD with the Democratic Union. He became a senator in 1997 and supported Jerzy Buzek's coalition. In 2000, after losing the chairmanship of the Union of Freedom to Bronisław Geremek, he resigned from the party.

On January 24, 2001, together with Andrzej Olechowski and Maciej Płażyński, he founded the Civic Platform (Platforma Obywatelska). Plazynski became the party chairman. In 2001 PO received 65 mandates in the lower house, becoming the largest oppositional party. On June 1, 2003 Tusk assumed the position of party chairman, which he holds presently.

Donald Tusk lost the 2005 presidential election to Lech Kaczyński. After the election, he remained chairman of his party.

In the 2007 parliamentary election, he received more than 534,000 votes, which is the best individual result in the electoral history of the Third Polish Republic. His Civic Platform won the election with 41% of the votes. Tusk was officially designated as Prime Minister on November 9 and took office on November 16. His cabinet won a vote of confidence in the Sejm on November 24, 2007.

Family

Donald Tusk's father, also named Donald Tusk (1930-1972), was a carpenter. His uncle was a Gdańsk sculptor, Bronisław Tusk (1935-2000). His grandfather, Józef Tusk (1907-1987) was a Polish railway official who, during World War II, served as a soldier in the Polish Army in the West, though he was compulsorily drafted into the Wehrmacht

Donald Tusk belongs to the Kashubian minority.

Editors of Newsweek Polska revealed that he had smoked marijuana when he was a student. He also loves soccer, occasionally plays it and watches major games on TV. After the Austria - Poland game during Euro 2008, he publicly said he felt like he wanted to kill "you know who" (most probably referee Howard Webb for granting Austria a penalty kick in the extra time).

Electoral history

Polish presidential election, 2005

Prime Minister of Poland (vote of confidence)

• Yes - 238
• No - 204
• Abstain - 2

References