On November 6, 1985, Wojciech Jaruzelski is elected chairman of Poland’s Council of State. He holds the post until April 1989, when the position is abolished and the office of president is created.
On July 19, 1989, Wojciech Jaruzelski is elected president of Poland – a position restored several months earlier following the agreements between the communist authorities and the opposition around “Solidarity”. The vote in the National Assembly is extremely close: 270 deputies and senators vote “for”, 233 vote “against”, and 34 abstain. Thus, Jaruzelski receives just one vote more than the required majority.
His election is not the beginning of his political career, but a new stage in his long presence at the helm of the Polish People’s Republic. On November 6, 1985, he is elected chairman of the Council of State – the collective body that performs the functions of head of state. He replaces Henryk Jabłoński in the post, while the premiership, which he had held until then, is taken over by Zbigniew Messner.
From Martial Law to the Presidency
Jaruzelski is a general, defense minister, and leader of the Polish United Workers’ Party. In December 1981, he imposes martial law, which puts “Solidarity” outside the law and leads to the arrest of its activists. This move turns his name into a symbol of hard-line communist rule, but later he is the one who takes part in the negotiations that lead to the political compromise of 1989.
When he is nominated as head of state, party deputy Marian Orzechowski presents him as an “outstanding Pole, a brave soldier” and a man with an “enormous sense of duty and personal modesty”. For the opposition, however, his candidacy remains associated with martial law and the repression of “Solidarity”. According to Poland’s Institute of National Remembrance, the support of some of those elected from the “Solidarity” lists is decisive for his election.
President at the Beginning of Change
The institution of the presidency is restored by the constitutional amendments of April 7, 1989, adopted after the round-table talks between the authorities and the opposition. The amendments also restore the Senate, while partially free parliamentary elections are held in June, in which candidates supported by “Solidarity” achieve a convincing result.
As president, Jaruzelski remains part of the transitional political balance. In August 1989, he asks Tadeusz Mazowiecki to form a government. Mazowiecki becomes the first non-communist prime minister in Poland’s postwar history. On December 29 of the same year, the constitution removes the leading role of the communist party, and the state restores the name Republic of Poland.
Jaruzelski’s term ends on December 22, 1990, when Lech Wałęsa assumes the presidency. Thus, the general remains both the first president of Poland after the restoration of the institution and the last president of the Polish People’s Republic.
Sources: washingtonpost.com, upi.com