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Andrzej Sebastian Duda - 06 Aug 2015

Andrzej Duda, Poland’s new president, is young, smart, dynamic - and relatively unknown. But he has a well-known backer: Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the conservative head of the Law and Justice Party. Andrzej Duda, 43, ousted Civic Platform (PO) incumbent Bronislaw Komorowski in the runoff. The member of the European Parliament for the right-wing euroskeptic Law and Justice Party (PiS) secured about 53 percent of the vote in an election in which turnout reached 56 percent.

Poland's Roman Catholic church congratulated Duda, whose opinions on many issues fall in line with conservative religious thought. The former justice minister and member of national parliament promised increased social spending, earlier retirement and lower taxes. Duda has called for NATO to station troops in Poland as protection against Russia and cautioned against entering the eurozone, saying the country should only do once currency's debt woes have passed.

Duda was sworn in at the presidential palace in the Polish capital, Warsaw, on 06 August 2015 after being elected in a surprise victory at a May ballot. The Krakow-born lawyer, who campaigned on pledges to cut the retirement age, raise the threshold for tax-free income and pay child benefits, was a member of the center-right opposition Law and Justice party (PiS) before relinquishing his membership after the election. Although a Polish president is expected to remain politically neutral, Duda will have the power to veto acts of parliament and to initiate his own bills. The president is also head of the armed forces and has a say in foreign policy.

Duda promised to reject all bills aimed at bringing about fundamental changes in the country, saying that he is ready to go beyond a merely ceremonial role to "repair the republic." In his first speech as president, Duda, 43, said that he was especially concerned about his country's security in view of an increasingly assertive Russia, calling for "a greater presence of NATO in this part of Europe." The call came as Poland's neighbor, Ukraine, remained embroiled in a months-long insurgency pitting Russia-backed separatist rebels in the country's east against the westward-leaning government in Kyiv.

Andrzej Duda was born on 16 May 1972 in Kraków. The politician's father (Jan Tadeusz Duda) is a professor of technical sciences, and his mother (Janina-Milewska Duda) is a professor of chemical sciences.

Duda, the President of the Republic of Poland and a great friend of Ukrainians, has Ukrainian roots. His grandfather, Mikhail Ivanovich Duda, was a Ukrainian military commander, better known by his nickname Zinovy Gromenko. The grandfather of the future president of Poland was born on November 21, 1921 in the village of Soroki-Lviv (Pustomitovsky district, Lviv region) and died on July 7, 1950 near the village of Tanyava [Bolekhovsky city council, Ivano-Frankivsk region]). During his short life, Mikhail Iwanowicz Duda managed to become a lieutenant of the UPA, the commander of the "Iron Hundreds", which was part of the second barrack of the 26th Group in Przemysl. He was posthumously awarded the title of Knight of the Golden Cross of Military Merit, 1st class.

In 1984 Duda joined the 5th Kraków Scouting Troop “Piorun” named after the Legionaries of 1914. After a few years’ time, Duda became its scoutmaster. Duda concluded my adventure with scouting in 1990. In Poland, at least, the term "boy scout" is associated with a mythical grandeur, and not just in the country's conservative circles. It's synonymous with characteristics such as patriotism, honesty, and self-sacrifice. Many scouts were still children when they fought and died during the Warsaw Uprising in 1944 - a defining moment for Polish patriotism. The aura of heroism lives on today, and Duda used it cleverly during his election campaign. Voters wanted a patriot who would take care of them, and do anything he could - both for them and for Poland.

In 1987-1991, Duda attended a course in general education with extended curriculum in humanities in Jan III Sobieski High School in Kraków.

In 1991, Duda enrolled at the Department of Law and Administration of the Jagiellonian University. In February 1997, Duda defended my Master’s Thesis and started working as an academic teacher and scholar at the Chair of Administrative Proceedings, and as of 2001, the Chair of Administrative Law at the Jagiellonian University.

In January 2005, following the presentation of my dissertation “The Legal Interest in the Polish Administrative Law”, Duda earned a PhD in law. In the spring of 2005, Duda set up my own law firm.

Following the parliamentary elections of 2005, Duda became a legislation expert for the Law and Justice Parliamentary Caucus. Duda went from being a member of the national conservative Law and Justice Party (PiS) to its legal expert following a parliamentary election victory in September 2005. He climbed the rungs rapidly after that: A post as deputy justice minister, then as an aide to Lech Kaczynski during his presidency. He changed positions with breathtaking speed. One year here, two months there. It was a steep, promising political career under Kaczynski's guidance.

On 1 August 2006, Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski appointed Duda Deputy Minister of Justice. Duda was recalled from the position on 15 November 2007, following my election as member of the Tribunal of State by the Sejm.

On 16 January 2008, President Lech Kaczynski appointed Duda Undersecretary of State in the Chancellery of the President. April 2010, when President Lech Kaczynski died in a plane crash near Smolensk. After Bronislaw Komorowski was elected to the office of the President of Poland in July 2010, Duda tendered my resignation. Duda retreated and returned to Krakow after Bronislaw Komorowski was elected to be the new Polish head of state. He was still a member of parliament and press spokesman for the PiS, but no one took much notice anymore. His stint in the European Parliament in the conservative/reform faction was equally quiet.

In 2010, Duda won a seat in the City Council of Kraków and additionally assumed the position of the chairman of the Club of Law and Justice City Councillors.

Following the parliamentary elections of 9 October 2011, running from the Law and Justice list in the Kraków constituency Duda was elected deputy to the Sejm with 79 981 votes. In the Sejm, Duda served as Deputy Chair of the Committee for Constitutional Liability.

On 27 November 2013, Duda assumed the position of a press spokesman for Law and Justice. Duda continued in this capacity until 9 January 2014, when the Political Committee of Law and Justice appointed Duda chief of campaign in the forthcoming elections to the European Parliament. On 25 May 2014 Duda obtained an MEP mandate of with 97 996 votes.

at the end of 2014, party chairman Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the twin brother of Lech, made the surprising announcement that Duda would run as the presidential candidate for the PiS. He himself had decided to remain in the background. Duda announced that he wanted to carry on as Lech Kaczynski's "spiritual heir."

In the first round of the elections to the office of the President of the Republic of Poland on 10 May 2015, Duda won 34, 76% of all valid votes. In the run-off on 24 May 2015, Duda was elected President of the Republic of Poland, having gained 51, 55% of the valid votes.

On 6 August 2015, having taken the oath of office before the National Assembly, Duda assumed the office of the President of the Republic of Poland.

Duda was clever in his positions on European issues. For example, he said that the euro will only be introduced in Poland "when all Poles are earning as much as people in the West." The Polish president sees himself as a European, and carefully avoids any direct attacks on the EU. He has nothing against the union, as long as it doesn't hurt Poland's national interests. That means: Yes to Europe, as long as Poland is a "strong, powerful country at the heart of a unified Europe."

On December 21, 1994, Andrzej Duda married Agata Kornhauser-Duda, who is the daughter of Julian Kornhauser, a well-known Polish-Jewish writer, translator and literary critic. She works as a German teacher. The couple has a daughter, Kinga, who was born in 1995 and graduated from the Jagiellonian University in law. Agata vouched for his reliability. The couple, who have a 20-year-old daughter, have been married for 20 years. They met while at school in Krakow - the same school where she continues to work today as a German teacher. Before the presidential election, the only famous member of her family was Agata's father, the poet and professor Julian Kornhauser. Duda is also proud of his family tree, and especially of his grandfather, who "as a cavalryman, rode against the Russians in 1920 and against the Germans in 1939," Germany's "Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung" wrote. Duda, the paper said, is "a man with the perfect conservative biography."

His favorite sport is skiing. Andrzej Duda's pet is a ferret named Freda. The politician posted his photo from the election campaign on his Twitter profile.