( L - R ) Kaczynski and Lepper

WARSAW (Reuters):

Polish Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski said yesterday he would fire one of his deputies if prosecutors pressed charges against him over allegations that he recruited workers for his party in return for sex.

Andrzej Lepper, one of four deputy prime ministers and the leader of the leftist Self-Defence party, which is a member of the government coalition and a key ally of the prime minister, has strongly denied the allegations.

"I have spoken with Mr. Lepper, who denied the accusations. I don't see any possibility of working together with people who have committed such acts, but right now the justice system is checking those allegations," Kaczynski told public radio.

"There is a very serious accu-sation that must be checked," he said. "If the prosecution decides there are grounds to press charges, then from my point of view, the situation will be clear."

Public prosecutors launched an investigation on Monday following a front-page story on the accusations in one of Poland's leading daily newspapers.

Kaczynski's conser-vative Law and Justice party holds only 153 of the 460 seats in the lower house of parliament and is heavily dependent on its coalition allies.

Embarrassment

The accusations are an embarrassment to Kac-zynski's government, which came to power a year ago promising a "moral revolution" and higher standards in politics after a string of scandals under the previous leftist administration.

But analysts said the loss of Lepper, if he were forced to resign, could strengthen the government eventually.

It was unclear what the rest of the Self-Defence party would do if their leader resigned from the government.

They might stay in alliance with the ruling conservatives or be willing to work with them on an issue-by-issue basis, analysts said.

Alternatively, Kaczynski might find other allies and could form a new coalition without the support of his current minority partners, which have been irritants in recent months.

Lepper's party almost brought about the collapse of the coalition in September by insisting on higher public spending in the 2007 budget, while the other coalition party's extreme right has provided a series of unwelcome headlines.