Lech Walesa’s supporters predict they’ll get “50 percent plus one” of the seats in Poland’s parliamentary election in two months by appealing to the nation’s largest bloc of voters-those who can’t stand politicians.
“We’ll make people active and make them understand that they’re important. They must say `yes’ or `no’-but they must say something,” said Undersecretary of State Andrzej Kozakiewicz.
Aware of public disillusionment with Poland’s new democracy and the 200-plus parties that sprang up, bickering and squabbling all the way, President Walesa has created something called the “Non-Party Reform Bloc,” known by its Polish initials BBWR.
With its non-party status, it hopes to attract those who are sick of the name-calling and other shenanigans common among the 29 parties that made their way into the last parliament.
BBWR soon will announce its list of parliamentary candidates for districts throughout Poland. Kozakiewicz stressed that they “must be local heros”-perhaps doctors, professors or farmers-who are well known in their communities.
He argues that the bloc has no members, as parties do, and offers “open arms” toward anyone-even former Communists ready for reform. “Our arms are closed only to the people of the Far Right,” he said.
In its brief political life, polls show BBWR already has become one of the most popular choices for voters in the Sept. 19 election. It also has incurred the immediate anger of rivals who say the bloc is nothing but another party, its name changed for political purposes.
“We’ve got 218 political parties registered in Poland and this is the next one-the 219th party. Nothing more,” said Andrzej Potocki, spokesman for the Democratic Union party. “The name `non-party bloc’ means President Walesa wants to play on the disappointed feeling people have toward political parties.”
“What is it if it’s not a party?” agreed Aleksander Luczak of the Polish Peasants Party.
Walesa came under intense attack last week after a nationally televised speech supporting BBWR. Newspapers jumped all over him the next morning, leaving him angry and defensive at a follow-up news conference.
“Don’t you see your surveys-your own surveys?” Walesa asked reporters in frustration. “The nation doesn’t believe in parties . . . I want to save the nation.”
If it weren’t for BBWR, Walesa said, Poland could end up in the hands of four top parties, all with different outlooks. He named the former Communists and the Peasants Party, along with the nationalist, anti-communist Confederation for an Independent Poland and the liberal, reform-oriented Democratic Union.
If no stabilizing force entered the scene, there would be “anarchy and disarray,” he said.
Confusion and disillusionment already have hit Poland’s 3-year-old democracy. Poles who fought for years for the right to vote freely now find capitalism isn’t what they thought it would be.
Instead of bringing prosperity to all, it has brought riches to some, poverty to others and 14 percent unemployment.
As a non-party bloc, BBWR advocates rapid privatization, restitution to those whose property was seized during Communist years, a new constitution that gives more power to the presidency and persistent movement toward free-market reforms.
It cites four columns of support: farmers, employers, workers and local governing bodies. Critics say that its program is general enough for almost anyone to support, and that the four legs of support actually represent conflicting interests.
The September elections were made necessary by Walesa’s dissolution of parliament in May. He made that decision after squabbling parties voted out the government of Prime Minister Hanna Suchocka.
By dismissing parliament instead of firing Suchocka, Walesa surprised some but brought hope to Poles who say a new parliament could be less factionalized and more productive.
In fact, a new election law almost guarantees that. It requires parties to get at least 5 percent of the vote before gaining representation in parliament. Its requirement for the “coalition” category, which is probably how BBWR would be designated, is tougher-8 percent.
With the new addition of BBWR, it remains to be seen whether the election will draw more voters than the October 1991 parliamentary election, when only about 40 percent of voters bothered to come to the polls.
