The leaders of Poland's two junior coalition partners decided Monday to remain in the tri-party Law and Justice (PiS) government of Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski, thus averting a snap election this autumn, according to dpa. However, the populist Samoobrona farmers' party leader Andrzej Lepper and Roman Giertych, the controversial Deputy Polish Prime Minister and leader of the Catholic-nationalist League of Polish Families (LPR), announced their parties would join forces to create a new formation, Liga and Samobroona (LiS). The LiS - an acronym meaning "fox" in Polish, would take shape at a later date, the leaders said, stressing both their parties would remain in tact for the time being. Commentators say the move is designed to boost the chances of both marginally popular parties to surpass the 5 per cent voter threshold required to enter parliament should in the event of an early election. Lepper said it was now up to Prime Minister Kaczynski to decide whether Poles would face early election this fall. The Samoobrona leader also called for a special parliamentary commission to probe an Anti-Corruption Bureau (CBA) operation which he claims tried to frame him for bribe-taking - allegations which saw Kaczynski sack him as deputy prime minister and agriculture minister abruptly last week. "The role of politicians in this case, perhaps the prime minister in all this, in thinking up this entire affair, must be investigated," Lepper told reporters in Warsaw. Lepper alleged the CBA, created by Kaczynski's government to rid the state of graft, was being used as political police to eliminate PiS rivals. Opposition politicians have demanded the CBA be dismantled. CBA investigators appear to have no concrete evidence suggesting Lepper took a bribe in connection with the case, based on re-zoning agricultural land for commercial and residential use in the Mazurian Lakes region, a popular holiday destination in north-east Poland. The Samoobrona party leader insists he is completely innocent. His dismissal cast a shadow over the future of the Kaczynski government, with the prime minister himself saying early elections were possible this coming fall. Poland's next scheduled general election is due in the autumn of 2009. PiS Prime Minister Kaczynski took command of the rocky three-party coalition government including the populist Samoobrona and the right-wing LPR a year ago, after taking over from Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz. Kaczynski sacked Lepper last year over personal differences only to renominate him within a few weeks after a political scandal sent PiS popularity ratings into a nose-dive.
