Polish voters choose mayors in hundreds of cities in run-off election

Polish voters chose mayors in hundreds of cities and towns where no candidate won outright in the first round of the country’s local elections two weeks ago.

Those are places where no single candidate won at least 50% of the vote during the first round of elections on April 7.

Exit polls were released after voting ended on Sunday evening, but there were no results announced immediately.

In Krakow, with one of the most closely watched races, the exit poll put the two candidates within the margin of error and the race could not be called.

Mr Tusk’s party did well in big cities including Warsaw, where his party’s candidate, Rafal Trzaskowski, easily won re-election as mayor two weeks ago.

However, Mr Tusk failed to win a decisive victory overall.

The main opposition party, Law and Justice, which held power at national level from 2015-23, won a greater percentage of votes in the provincial assemblies.

Mr Tusk’s socially liberal Civic Coalition has strong support in cities, while Law and Justice has a stronger base in conservative rural areas, particularly in eastern Poland.

In the election of the provincial assemblies, Law and Justice obtained 34.3% of the votes nationwide and Mr Tusk’s Civic Coalition received 30.6%.