WHY I SHALL VOTE FOR LECH WALESA

Radek Sikorski is backing

the radical candidate in Sunday's presidential elections

Warsaw MY FAVOURITE candidate for the pres- idency of Poland is Zbigniew Brzezinski and I hereby vow to erect a small shrine to Our Lady of Jasna Gora, should he at this late stage somehow enter the contest. But, as we say in Poland, if you can't have what you like, you must like what you have, and among the six more or less unsuitable candidates surely the victor will be either the Solidarity leader, Lech Walesa, or the Prime Minister, Tadeusz Mazowiecki. The oaf or the invalid.

Mazowiecki reminds me of Michael Foot. The same tortured intellectualism, the same physical frailty (he actually fainted in parliament during his inaugural Speech), the same decency without a touch of magnetism. When he came to power last summer, under a compromise deal which gave the communists a majority of seats in parliament and General Jaruzelski the post of president, he seemed an ideal choice. Once nominated to serve as an indepen- dent in the then communist parliament, once editor of a Catholic magazine, once editor of Solidarity Weekly, he seemed the one man whom the communists, the oPposition, the Church, and even the Russians could trust. Poland was then the only country in the block experimenting with a non-communist government, and the road away from socialism still seemed long and thorny. Mazowiecki with his unhurried prudence was the right guide: When communism crashed, Mazowie- ekes assets lost value. Months in power revealed shortcomings. Or perhaps re- vealed is the wrong word, because Mazo- wiecki — whether out of modesty, aloof- ness or a misunderstanding of democratic leadership — has not revealed himself. He has governed in a style reminiscent of the departed communists. Not once has he argued for or against something with con- viction. Not once has he answered his critics point by point. Fundamental deci- sions, such as Poland's continued mem- bership of the Warsaw Pact, the introduc- tion of religion into schools, or the con- tinuation of the communist-dominated par- lament were never publicly thrashed out. He let anonymous committees decide

things for him, just like in the good old days. Rather than an officer leading his troops from the front, Mazowiecki is a first world war field-marshal directing opera- tions from a distant château.

Under Mazowiecki, the ruling elite has continued to enjoy communist-style per- quisites. Not only ministers, but their wives and children, for example, use special government hospitals, privileged clinics where the ruling elite, present and past, gets medical care of an almost decent standard. Why have ministers, both old and new, been allowed to buy lavish government flats in Warsaw at a fraction of their market value? Mazowiecki himself remains uncorrupted, but he inherited old rules which a leader more in touch with popular sentiments would have abolished during his first few weeks in office. While complaining that the press has been hard on his government, he has failed to reform the state radio and television monopoly, a communist dinosaur which employs over 12,000 people and consumes mountains of cash.

Then there is the other candidate. Un- couth, unpredictable, irresponsible, dic- tatorial, vain, manipulative — each of the charges against Walesa contains a core of truth. He sounds reasonable in English, when an interpreter's organising intelli- gence has decided what he thinks Walesa means. To a Pole, his torrents of un-

'It's a common occupational ailment — backbencher's arm.' finished sentences, mixed metaphors and incoherent babble can be bewildering. He never pauses to think before answering a question.

And yet — pearls of wisdom occasional- ly gleam in the muck. 'In the West,' Walesa recently told a rally of miners in Silesia, 'only failures earn a salary beyond thirty. When you've saved up, you buy a truck or two, employ your wife as an accountant and work for yourself. I can see dozens of future small entrepreneurs among you.' In Britain, this would be described as 'defence of Victorian values'.

Walesa's pet idea is 'to give every Pole $10,000 to buy out state industry'. Warsaw intelligentsia takes this as the final evi- dence that the man is irresponsible and dangerous — a cheap populist who will promise anything to get elected. Yet the idea is surely right. Capitalism has to be created in a country with no capital, no knowledge of market rules and powerful anti-market prejudices inculcated by 40 years of hostile propaganda. People have to be bribed to accept it. Instead of selling shares on the cheap — Mrs Thatcher's method to reach the same goal — the Treasury would issue each Pole with share certificates. Provided the value of certifi- cates can be balanced with the value of privatised companies, neither the currency nor the budget should suffer. It might in fact be the most realistic scheme for creating a share-owning democracy.

What tips the scales for me is not programmes and promises, but energy and instincts. Contrary to what the Mazowiecki supporters claim, Poland does not need steady management and careful husband- ing. It needs radical change. If Poland is to pick up, thousands of state companies must be privatised in a matter of months rather than decades.

Omens for the near future could hardly be worse. It is next year that the economic crunch will arrive in Poland. The bill for replacing energy supplies from the disin- tegrating Soviet Union with expensive Arab oil will be colossal. At the same time Poland has lost its Comecon export mar- kets and the one hard-currency market with which it had a large trade surplus: Iraq.

Domestic prospects are equally frighten- ing. Unemployment has exceeded one million (7 per cent of the work force) and is likely to double next year. And this year's relatively slow rise in unemployment com- es from slow reactions to Poland's monet- ary reform. Production has fallen by one quarter, but the banking system is so sclerotic, financial discipline so slack and state companies so slow in adapting that effects are delayed — but they will not be delayed for ever. Poland needs a president who will be able to convince people that it is perfectly natural for them to lose their jobs, for their rents to quadruple or for their energy bills to go up sevenfold. Walesa has the credibility to explain that this is all a delayed bill for communist rule. Mazowiecki is incapable of convincing anybody of anything, as even his suppor- ters admit.

Nor is this surprising, for how can business flourish when telephones don't work, Polish base credit rate is 43 per cent per annum, and national insurance tax 15 per cent? Only seven medium-sized state companies are due to be sold this year — out of 7,000 — which hardly testifies to a reformist frenzy. Despite market-friendly rhetoric, Mazowiecki's record on en- couraging enterprise is modest.

A vote for Walesa is risky, but not as risky as his opponents — screaming of a potential dictator — claim. As stated in Poland's fluid constitution, the Polish pres- idency is largely ceremonial. Most likely, he will find himself institutionally tamed, and be given only moral influence to instigate change.

With luck, Walesa may turn out a Polish Ronald Reagan or rather a poor man's Pilsudski. He may not be the subject of intellectuals but he has an unmistakable instinct for the prejudices and expectations of middle Poland, and the charisma to carry it with him. In concepts that every miner, shipyard worker and peasant far- mer can grasp, he will set a straightforward agenda and pursue it with his customary determinaton. Far from undermining the government programme, he will give it the push it needs. In that case Our Lady will get a fat candle.