• Poland's largest opposition party, Law and Order Party (PiS), collapsed after leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski expelled former prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki amid infighting over the party's future direction.
• The split was framed by Kaczynski as a voluntary resignation by Morawiecki and allied lawmakers for refusing to sign a party loyalty pledge, but Morawiecki and political observers saw it as a forced ousting, with 40 members of parliament also leaving.
• The collapse of PiS signifies the end of Kaczynski's dominance, with the party being overtaken by the right and facing uncertainty for the future, posing a challenge for Prime Minister Donald Tusk's liberal-conservative Civic Coalition in the upcoming parliamentary elections.

Poland's right-wing Law and Order Party (PiS) collapsed on Friday after its leader Jarosław Kaczyński expelled former prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki amid infighting over the party's future direction.

While Kaczyński framed the split as a voluntary resignation by Morawiecki and a group of allied lawmakers for refusing to sign a party loyalty pledge, Morawiecki and political observers saw this as a forced ousting.

Forty members of parliament are also leaving, according to Morawiecki, who has not yet indicated whether he intends to form his own party.

Party's future course at the heart of the conflict

At the heart of the conflict was the future course of the once-powerful party that governed Poland from 2015 to 2023, reshaping the country according to its own vision, and leading it into a protracted conflict with the EU.

In March, Kaczyński nominated hardliner Przemysław Czarnek as his candidate for prime minister in next year's parliamentary election. His stated aim was to make PiS more attractive to voters of far-right parties.

The economically liberal former banker Morawiecki, 58, who served as prime minister from 2017 to 2023, felt slighted by Czarnek's nomination.

He responded by founding the "Development Plus" group with moderate colleagues and demanded that PiS "return to a broad coalition of the Polish right and centre-right parties."

Kaczyński in turn issued an ultimatum: the group had to dissolve and all members were to sign a declaration of loyalty. Morawiecki let the ultimatum expire. "We couldn't allow ourselves to be forced to sign declarations of loyalty," he said as he exited the party.

The party council would formalize the resignation of Morawiecki and "30" of his supporters on Tuesday, according to Kaczyński.

With 186 lawmakers PiS was previously the largest faction in the Polish parliament.

End of Kaczyński's dominance

Morawiecki's resistance to Kaczyński made it clear to many Poles that the 77-year-old PiS leader, who founded PiS in 2001 with his twin brother Lech, no longer has his party under control.

PiS is currently being overtaken by the right as its poll numbers stand at 23% support - 12 percentage points lower than in the 2023 parliamentary elections.

Meanwhile, the far-right Confederation of the young entrepreneur Sławomir Mentzen (12.4%) and the party of far-right politician Grzegorz Braun (9.6%) together garner almost the same amount. Both are particularly popular among young male voters in rural areas.

PiS achieved a major success when independent candidate Karol Nawrocki, whom they supported, won the 2025 presidential election, However, the 47-year-old former boxer has become so popular among young right-wingers that many see Nawrocki as a more suitable leader than the ageing Kaczyński.

Uncertainty too for the Tusk camp

Prime Minister Donald Tusk reacted on Friday with derision to the PiS's problems. "They're fighting so hard for party unity that nothing is left standing," he wrote on X.

However, the disintegration of PiS presents a challenge for Tusk's liberal-conservative Civic Coalition (PO), especially since the 69-year-old Tusk, like his arch-rival Kaczyński, belongs to a generation of politicians whose era is coming to an end.

Like Germany, Poland is also seeing a fragmentation of the political landscape with growing support for right-wing extremist groups, which can pose a threat to Tusk's alliance in the next parliamentary elections.

Morawiecki has already declared that his party will not form a coalition with any of the current governing parties.