Poland’s top politicians spell out their varied plans for the anniversary of the 1989 elections…and show that this is not as easy a matter as might be expected.

Former president and Solidarity leader Lech Wałęsa said he has accepted Prime Minister Tusk’s invitation and will go to Krakow on 4 June for a meeting of the leaders of the Visegrad Group (the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary).  

The former Solidarity leader, and a key figure in any celebration of the end of communism in Poland, added that in the afternoon hours he will return to Gdansk to address an international conference, ‘Solidarity and the collapse of communism’.

The Visegrad Group summit, to mark the 20th anniversary of the parliamentary elections which brought Solidarity a landslide victory, was originally to be held in Gdansk - often known as the ‘cradle of the Solidarity movement’ as this was where the trade union was formed during the strikes of 1980. But Prime Minister Tusk decided to move the venue to the royal Wawel Castle in Krakow, claiming that a planned Solidarity demonstration against recent demands from the European Commission to cut production at the old shipyard - which would mean many redundancies - could disturb the celebrations, closely watched by international media.

Though unpopular in much of the country, Wałęsa described Tusk’s decision as ‘correct’.

Even though the Solidarity union later said that only a peaceful rally is planned after a thanksgiving open-air mass at the Solidarity memorial in Gdansk, outside the gates of the famous shipyard, the government said its plans will not be changed.  

However, as a government spokesman said two days ago, after the Visegrad Group summit in Krakow in the morning hours on 4 June, the Prime Minister would go to Gdansk later in the day.

Former president  - and an ex-member of Poland’s communist party - Aleksander Kwasniewski said he has been invited by Prime Minister Tusk to attend the summit of the Visegrad Group in Krakow.

President Lech Kaczynski  - a prominent member of the Solidarity movement in the 1980s - plans to celebrate the 1989 elections anniversary in Gdansk, but head of the presidential chancellery has hinted that he may go to Krakow as well.

Opposition leader, and the president’s twin brother, Jaroslaw Kaczynski of the Law and Justice party said in a radio interview: ‘I have been invited to Krakow and am grateful for the invitation. But it is obvious to me that my place is in Gdansk where Solidarity was born. This is where I should be, in view of my political biography and, first of all, as a Pole, as a Polish citizen’. (mk/pg)