22 NOVEMBER 1930, Page 10

Poland

The Polish General Election has appreciably helped Marshal Pilsudski to build up that Parliamentary majority which he has always wanted. Cynical onlookers have wondered why he was so intent upon having a majority behind his acts of executive authority, as he was apparently well able to get on without it. Since the coup d'etat of 1926 the army has been unwaveringly loyal to him. When he became the virtual dictator of Poland he had a mere handful of supporters in Parliament. At the General Election of 1928 he failed to get a majority, but he made some progress towards it. Now at last his own Party, the Government Party, has a majority over all the others. This is the result of an elaborately careful " making " of the elections. Imprisonment, intimida- tion, the offer of glittering prizes—each applied to suit particular cases—have done their work. Whether Mar- shal Pilsudski will take off his hat to the majority now that he has got it and allow it to borrow some of his authority has yet to be seen. Perhaps that will depend upon whether the policy of the " free and independent " delegates has the advantage of coinciding with his own.

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