1991 Polish parliamentary election

The 1991 Polish parliamentary election was held on 27 October 1991 to elect deputies to both houses of the National Assembly.[2] The 1991 election was notable on several counts. It was the first parliamentary election to be held since the formation of the Third Republic, the first entirely free and competitive legislative election since the fall of communism, the first completely free legislative election of any sort since 1928, and only the fifth completely free election in all of Polish history. Due to the collapse of the Solidarity movement's political wing, the 1991 election saw deep political fragmentation, with a multitude of new parties and alliances emerging in its wake.[3] Low voting thresholds within individual constituencies, along with a five percent national threshold allocated to a small portion of the Sejm, additionally contributed to party fragmentation.[4] As a result, 29 political parties gained entry into the Sejm and 22 in the Senate, with no party holding a decisive majority. Two months of intense coalition negotiations followed, with Jan Olszewski of the Centre Agreement forming a minority government along with the Christian National Union, remnants of the broader Center Civic Alliance, and the Peasants' Agreement, with conditional support from Polish People's Party, Solidarity and other minor parties.[5]

1991 Polish parliamentary election

27 October 1991 (1991-10-27)
All 460 seats in the Sejm 231 seats were needed for a majority in the Sejm All 100 seats in the Senate
Turnout	43.2%
First party Second party Third party   Leader Tadeusz Mazowiecki Aleksander Kwaśniewski Wiesław Chrzanowski Party UD SLD WAK Leader since May 1991 30 January 1990 28 October 1989 Leader's seat Poznań Warsaw Lublin Last election Did not exist 173 seats, 37.6% Did not exist Seats before 49[1] 102[1] Seats won 62 60 49 Seat change 13 42 New Popular vote 1,382,051 1,344,820 980,304 Percentage 12.3% 12.0% 8.7% Swing New 25.6% New   Fourth party Fifth party Sixth party   Leader Jarosław Kaczyński Waldemar Pawlak Leszek Moczulski Party POC PSL KPN Leader since 12 May 1990 29 June 1991 1 September 1979 Leader's seat Warsaw Płock Kraków Last election Did not exist 76 seats, 16.5% none Seats won 44 48 46 Seat change New 28 46 Popular vote 977,344 972,952 841,738 Percentage 8.7% 8.7% 7.5% Swing New 7.8% 7.5%   Seventh party Eighth party Ninth party   Leader Donald Tusk Józef Ślisz Marian Krzaklewski Party KLD PSL-PL NSZZ „S” Leader since 19 May 1991 1991 23 February 1991 Leader's seat Gdańsk Did not stand Did not stand Last election none none none Seats won 37 28 28 Seat change New New New Popular vote 839,978 613,626 566,553 Percentage 7.5% 5.5% 5.1% Swing New New New
Seats won by Sejm District
Prime Minister before election Jan Krzysztof Bielecki KLD New Prime Minister Jan Olszewski Centre Agreement

460 members of parliament (poseł) were elected; 391 from 6980 candidates from 37 regional lists of candidates and 69 from country-wide lists of candidates. In the Sejm elections, 27,517,280 citizens were eligible to vote, 11,887,949 (43.2%) of them cast their votes, 11,218,602 (94.4%) of those were counted as valid. In the Senate elections, 43.2% of citizens cast their votes, 96.5% were valid.

Elections were supervised by the National Electoral Commission (Państwowa Komisja Wyborcza). 37 regional (okręgowe) commissions were formed, and 22,341 district (obwodowe), staffed by 197,389 citizens.

A remarkable 111 parties competed and 29 parties (listed below) won Parliamentary seats. The success of the frivolous Polish Beer-Lovers' Party with 16 seats gained news coverage worldwide.