Polish opposition presidential candidate Nawrock calls for rate cut

WARSAW (Reuters) - The presidential candidate supported by Poland's largest opposition party, Law and Justice (PiS), has joined other election hopefuls in urging the central bank to cut interest rates, partly to bring down borrowing costs for consumers.

"Poles must finally get lower loan instalments. That is why I am calling on the Monetary Policy Council to lower interest rates. Thanks to this decision, millions of borrowers will breathe a sigh of relief," Karol Nawrock, who is backed by the nationalist PiS, said in a video on X on Tuesday, which was verified by Reuters.

The cost of credit, which has remained unchanged since October 2023, has become a prominent topic in the campaign for the presidential election, the first round of which is scheduled for May 18, with a run-off vote likely on June 1.

The frontrunner in the race, Rafal Trzaskowski, who represents Prime Minister Donald Tusk's Civic Coalition (KO), has said repeatedly that borrowing costs should fall.

Szymon Holownia, speaker of the lower house of parliament and the centre-right Third Way candidate, has also called for interest rate cuts.

The governor of the National Bank of Poland (NBP) Adam Glapinski, who was appointed by PiS when they were in power, reiterated last week that Poland's elevated rate of inflation left no space for policy easing.

NBP Vice President Marta Kightley told the Interia.pl news portal last week that politicians' appeals for interest rate cuts, while inflation is rising, would expose Poles to a risk of lasting high inflation. She also said the central bank was independent.

Annual inflation in March was 4.9%, according to a flash estimate from the statistics office, unchanged from February and well above the upper limit of the central bank's inflation target of 1.5-3.5%.

Still, some members of the monetary policy committee said easing of policy may begin in the second half, after publication of the central bank's inflation projection in July.

The committee will announce its decision on Wednesday, but none of the analysts surveyed by Reuters expects an interest rate cut in April. The National Bank of Poland has held its main interest rate at 5.75% since October 2023.

(Reporting by Pawel Florkiewicz; Editing by Bernadette Baum)