Poland and Ireland have similar histories, Solidarity founder Lech Walesa tells Political Correspondent DEAGLÁN DE BRÉADÚN
HIS NAME may mean little to the younger generation but Lech Walesa probably did more than any other individual to overthrow the Soviet system of government in central and eastern Europe.
The electrician from the Lenin Shipyard in Gdansk led a titanic struggle as head of the 10 million-strong Solidarity trade union and ended up receiving the Nobel Peace Prize and becoming president of Poland (1990-95).
He was recently in Ireland as a guest of Fine Gael to support the campaign for a Yes vote on Lisbon but, earlier this year, Walesa attended European election rallies in Madrid and Rome organised by the anti-Lisbon group, Libertas.
“Do I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself,” the American poet Walt Whitman once wrote, and Walesa takes a similar approach.
Asked about US president Barack Obama’s decision to scrap the missile defence shield in Poland and the Czech Republic, Walesa points out that the US already has the potential to destroy the world 10 times over: “If there is any debate about anything else, it will be the debate over the 11th time to destroy the world.” Given that background, he says, “in military terms this is an absolutely pointless discussion”. However, he favours a continuing US military presence “especially in this very vulnerable [part of] Europe where things are still unstable”.
Although reported elsewhere as opposing Obama’s decision, he is quite ambivalent on the topic: “This is my classical approach to things: I am both in favour and against,” he tells me in the Constitution Room of the Shelbourne Hotel where the founding document of the Irish Free State was drafted by Michael Collins and others in 1922. Ironically in the light of Walesa’s pro-Lisbon mission, this was also the location chosen by Declan Ganley of Libertas a few days beforehand to urge a No vote in the referendum.
Asked to sign a book on modern Polish history, Walesa obliges with a flourish, then searches the index for his own name. It is there in profusion: no such chronicle could possibly leave him out. He also hands over his business card, requesting that the interview be e-mailed to him when it is published.
Walesa is a highly loquacious individual and one marvels at the ability of Magda, his interpreter, to keep pace with him, especially since he has a bad cough and is also drinking tea from a china cup.
There is only one question that stops him in his tracks: was he ever worried that the Russians or the Communists would kill him? “Well, I certainly was not scared, because I only fear the Lord. They could have killed me on so many occasions: they could have killed me but not defeated me.”
He is wearing a badge depicting Our Lady of Czestochowa, one of his country’s national symbols, which was given to him at the time Solidarity was established: “When we were involved in the strike in the shipyards in 1980 there was a threat of possible Soviet intervention. This was brought from Czestochowa and, totally to my surprise, pinned on my lapel.” He recalls that, “When things were really getting tough, I would delegate all the problems to her, and then I could have a rest.”
Asked if it is his first visit to Ireland, he replies: “No, no, I’ve been here before, on different occasions.” However, he is unable to recall the details: “I travel so much, I would really have to think hard.” He confesses he knows little about this country, “apart from the fact that Ireland also has had to put up with a tough, difficult neighbour: the neighbour has taken advantage of Ireland and Ireland has paid really a very high price for her freedom.
“Today, that is the reason why Ireland treasures so much her freedom and independence and is so cautious. So in a way we have had a similar history with the difference that you have had one neighbour and we have had two [Germany and Russia]”.
During his Dublin visit he had a meeting, at his own request, with Catholic Archbishop of Dublin Dr Diarmuid Martin: “He shows a good sense of politics so I didn’t really have to argue much to prove my point to him because he has the same perspective and he sees Europe and Europe’s dangers and challenges in the same way as I do. So this was really a very optimistic meeting and whenever I have such meetings, I recharge my batteries.”
If we rejected the Lisbon Treaty what would be the consequences? He outlines a two-speed Europe scenario with Ireland out in the cold. Europe needs to be united if it is to become a credible partner with the US, China and Russia on the global stage. The fallout, he says, would be “very bad”.