ON NEWS of the death of Tadeusz Mazowiecki, the former prime minister, the flags above the country’s parliament and presidential palace were lowered to half-mast.
This tribute to Mazowiecki, along with the copious news coverage dedicated to his life and career, reflected the stature of the man who presided over Poland as it took its first steps as a democracy after he became Poland’s (and the former Soviet bloc's) first non-communist prime minister in forty years when he took office in August 1989.
A tearful Bronislaw Komorowski, the president, paid tribute to Mazowiecki, saying “his determination and wisdom combined with calmness and courage meant that Poland was bound to succeed.” Lech Walesa, who served as president during the Mazowiecki government, called him “Poland’s greatest ever prime minister”.
Mazowiecki left an indelible mark on Polish history in the revolutionary period that surrounded the demise of communism. As a leading Solidarity activist he co-authored the so called “round-table agreement”, which paved the way for the return of democracy. During his tenure as prime minister he oversaw the dismantling of the one-party state, introduced freedoms, a new constitution and set Poland trundling along the path that would eventually lead to European Union membership.
Significantly, during his first speech to parliament, Mazowiecki also spoke of the need of drawing a “thick line” under the past. This was made to ensure that Poles concentrated on the future rather than tearing themselves apart over the past. The “thick line” helped to ease the transition process and avoided bitter recriminations but there are some in Poland who argue its presence meant that Poland failed to clean itself of the unwanted residue of the communist years.
Mazowiecki resigned as prime minister at the end of 1990, and never rose to high office again although he remained active in politics for a number years. In the early 1990s he also worked as the United Nations' special emissary on human rights for Yugoslavia, which had, by then, dissolved into bloody civil war. Frustrated by the unwillingness of foreign states and bodies to curb the violence in the Balkans, he quit in protest in 1995.
His resignation from the UN post on points of principle contributed to Mazowiecki’s burgeoning status as an elder statesman of Polish politics. With Polish democracy still relatively young, and the country’s vindictive political atmosphere often poisoning even great reputations, esteemed and revered political characters have been somewhat limited. But Mazowiecki became one, and his status as a modest and principled man flourished, especially later in his life as he became distant from the nitty-gritty of day to day politics.
Mazowiecki faced criticism that his government had moved too fast in liberating the economy from state control, and that it had resulted in unemployment and hardship. But this was accepted with good grace and he never resorted to the spiteful and personal attacks that now litter Polish political discourse.
With his passing Poland has lost one of the few politicians nearly all Poles felt proud of. And for many Mazowiecki’s passing also meant something else. His days as prime minister are bound to the memories of those heady and exciting months when Poland stood blinking in the new light of democracy after the dark and suffocating years of communism. His death is the end of an era.
