Poland's deeply unpopular ruling leftists picked energetic young farm minister Wojciech Olejniczak as their new leader on Sunday, opening the road to new talks to reunite the left ahead of elections in September, Reuters reported. Olejniczak was picked to replace veteran Jozef Oleksy, who resigned earlier this week after failing to repair the SLD's sleaze-ridden image and opinion poll ratings. The Democratic Left Alliance (SLD), which won 41 percent of the vote four years ago, is trailing in opinion polls and looks certain to lose power to a resurgent centre-right due to high unemployment and an image tarnished by numerous sleaze scandals. Analysts said Olejniczak's election held out hope of fresh moves to unify the left and revitalise the SLD before the polls, but cautioned that with popular support of 3-8 percent it may be too little too late. "The SLD is in a very difficult situation. We want it to be well represented in the next parliament and we will work hard for that," Olejniczak told reporters. "What I can say now is we want a party that is honest, normal, that functions properly." Marek Borowski, the leader of another leftist group who split from the SLD last year, applauded the move, but said more needed to be done to make possible the forming of an alliance that could take 15 percent of votes in September. --More 2332 Local Time 2032 GMT
