Today, former members of “Solidarity” need local round tables. They should talk around them for the good of democracy. That is better than confessions years later that one had been a licensed revolutionary, along with accusations of betrayal directed at those who took responsibility upon themselves and began governing without their brothers from the “right-wing” side.
The second volume of the “Bolesławiec Yearbook” opens with an article by Wiesław Ogrodnik, in which the author describes the 1989 elections to the contracted Sejm in Bolesławiec. He writes that Jan Kisiliczyk (a former MP and candidate supported by Lech Wałęsa) was imposed on the members of Bolesławiec “Solidarity.” The group supporting him was motivated by a desire to take power in the city and by hostility toward the other members of the Committee.
Betrayal according to Ogrodnik
Wiesław Ogrodnik describes an informal meeting at the Kisiliczyk family home, which he attended. Danuta Maślicka (a member of the “Solidarity” Citizens’ Committee) presented the criteria to be followed in the upcoming elections, as well as a person who met those criteria. This was several months before the official selection of the parliamentary candidate, which took place on April 20, 1989, in the catechetical room of the Sanctuary of the Blessed Virgin Mary during a meeting of the “Solidarity” Citizens’ Committee. “It was not a unanimous decision […]”* Ogrodnik writes in his text. “There was a heated discussion. […] At one point the conversation became unpleasant, and from both sides. Its climax was J. Kisiliczyk and D. Maślicka leaving the catechetical room”*. As Wiesław Ogrodnik writes, at this critical moment he too was offered the chance to stand as a candidate, but he firmly refused. The selection of Kisiliczyk, supposedly predetermined in his view, became a fact.
According to Ogrodnik, this was the beginning of the trouble. The group around the MP betrayed their “brothers” from Solidarity. Before the local elections, Jan Kisiliczyk supported not KO “Solidarity,” but his own Citizens’ Self-Government Committee at the MP’s Office. The OKS then put forward its own slate in the elections and won them (it introduced 17 representatives out of 32 councillors – editor’s note). This made it possible for OKS members to elect their own mayor – Józef Król (the first mayor after free local elections was elected by the City Council by majority vote).
Ogrodnik also outlines the broader context of this local betrayal. It was served up at the Round Table. There, he writes, the secular left gained the upper hand (Bronisław Geremek and Adam Michnik), pushing aside “the independence-oriented, national-democratic current faithful to values such as attachment to the Church and the Christian faith, national pride, and independence”*.
Putting himself on the sidelines
In the memorable year 1989, Wiesław Ogrodnik had two opportunities to change the course of events on Bolesławiec’s political scene. He was a member of the KO “Solidarity” committee on equal terms with Danuta Maślicka, who promoted Jan Kisiliczyk. Why did he not protest at the informal meeting at the Kisiliczyk family home? Why did he not look for and promote his own candidate during the several months preceding the Committee’s formal meeting? Finally, why did he not stand as a candidate himself? He has political ambitions that have now taken him to the position of deputy to the city’s highest official. Why, when the proposal was made at the time, did he refuse? If it is true that Jan Filipek asked Ogrodnik whether he would stand as a candidate when the fate of the candidate supported by Wałęsa was being decided, that means he was looking for a counter-candidate to Kisiliczyk.
Ogrodnik feels deceived. He considers himself a licensed revolutionary in a regulated revolution. He believes that in 1989 those who supported Kiszczak and Jaruzelski won. Today he regrets that he did not read fairy tales to his children instead of fighting for a free Poland.
The revolutionary’s betrayal
Not everyone managed to cope with freedom itself in those first days of the freedom they had won. The red beast disappeared, and with it the faultless revolutionaries. Freedom sank many people into a fog. And democracy was built groping in the dark. Yet it could be created only through action.
After its victory, the Citizens’ Self-Government Committee at the MP’s Office began its work. They won the local elections and held a majority in the City Council (17 OKS councillors, 13 KO “Solidarity” councillors, and 2 Democratic Party councillors). The division of “Solidarity” was a fact. Governing in the Council, electing its chair, and then electing the city’s mayor was not a fight against the red enemy. It was a fight against a brother. Mentally, the recent revolutionaries divided everything into white and red. When there was no longer a clear enemy, they named as one those who had a different idea of a free Poland. This division into left- and right-wing Solidarity members produced the Fourth Republic. It produced accusations that Wałęsa had collaborated with the communists and undermined the idea of the Round Table. It resulted in the denigration of the Poles’ independence uprising. What we could have been proud of suddenly became something to be ashamed of. This was the worst betrayal of “Solidarity” committed by its founders.
Asked for comment, Danuta Maślicka says she is proud that she worked for “Solidarity.” “I regret absolutely nothing,” assures Danuta Maślicka. “In our home, everything was subordinated to ‘Solidarity.’ Our family life was put to one side. I am proud of my activism. And I do not consider myself a revolutionary. Working in Wrocław, Gdańsk, and Bolesławiec, I met wonderful people. We wanted to invite citizens to govern and to take responsibility.”
From the perspective of the years, Ogrodnik’s accusations of betraying part of “Solidarity” are not as damaging as his belittling of the revolution itself and the struggle against the communist system. He was an active participant, and now he is giving a bad account of it.
Today we benefit from the freedom won by Ogrodnik and Maślicka, Kaczyński and Wałęsa. It was an enormous effort for all of them. It was a sacrifice that not every person is capable of making. Dividing people into better and worse, right and left, in this context undermines the meaning of the uprising itself. Former members of “Solidarity” must be willing to sit down at the same table. And explain the many betrayals to one another. We can thank them for what they did for Poland and for us. Democracy is not perfect. But they did not fight for an ideal world; they fought for a free world. By writing about a regulated revolution, Wiesław Ogrodnik diminishes its value. He harms not only himself; he also deprives Poles of a reason to be proud of their own history. This is the worst betrayal of a revolutionary.
* Wiesław Ogrodnik: Elections to the contracted Sejm in Bolesławiec in 1989, Bolesławiec Yearbook 2009. Bolesławiec 2010, Museum of Ceramics in Bolesławiec, pp. 10–16
(information by Grażyna Hanaf)