Warsaw
(AFP) - Poland's governing rightwing party on Thursday tapped its
Finance Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, an ex-banker, to replace Prime
Minister Beata Szydlo who tendered her resignation as the administration
focuses more on the economy.
"The
Law and Justice (PiS) party political committee has proposed the
candidature of Mateusz Morawiecki for prime minister," governing party
spokeswoman Beata Mazurek told reporters in Warsaw.
Mazurek added that Szydlo had tendered her resignation to the PiS political committee.
Earlier
Thursday, Szydlo survived a no-confidence motion in parliament tabled
by the liberal opposition, amid reports that she would be replaced by
her own party by the end of the day.
PiS
leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the country's most powerful politician and
the man believed to be calling all the shots, had also been one of the
figures tipped to replace Szydlo.
She
is expected to stay on as a deputy prime minister in the PiS
government, deputy foreign minister Jan Dziedziczak told the Polish PAP
news agency.
Further changes to the government are due in January, the PAP said.
Development
and Finance Minister Mateusz Morawiecki, 49, has made a name for
himself by taking on tax evasion and bolstering the welfare state.
Critics however 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.
He
is expected to focus the government's efforts on boosting economic
growth and investment during the second half of its four-year term.
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