The majority of Poles support President Lech Kaczynski’s initiative to pronounce 1 August, the anniversary of the 1944 Warsaw Rising, a national holiday.
The draft bill proclaiming 1 August a national holiday has already been forwarded to the Sejm,
the lower house of parliament. “My initiative is connected with the 65th anniversary of the Warsaw Rising,” said Lech Kaczynski. “I cannot imagine the bill will not to be passed.”
Seventy two percent of Poles support the idea with 21 percent opposing it, according to a survey conducted by a pollster Gfk Polonia.
The 1944 Warsaw Rising has become central to Poland’s national identity, when hundreds of thousands of insurgents rose up against Nazi occupiers. They were later crushed, as Soviet troops on the other side of the Vistula River looked on.
Polish politicians are divided over whether a national holiday should be declared to honour the rising. Jan Oldakowski, the director of the Warsaw Rising Museum and the Law and Justice deputy strongly supports the idea. Arkadiusz Rybicki from Civic Platform is against it, as, in his opinion, it may stir up another dispute over the significance and wisdom of the insurgency – which is disputed in some quarters.
Krystyna Lybacka from the Democratic Left Alliance thinks that it doesn’t really matter if 1 August is a national holiday because it is celebrated annually anyway. The most important is that the Warsaw Rising is commemorated, she says.
The survey was conducted on 29 July from a sample of 500. (mg/pg)