Mieczysław Jagielski

Mieczysław Zygmunt Jagielski (12 January 192427 February 1997) was a Polish politician and economist. During the times of the People's Republic of Poland he was the last leading politician from the former eastern regions of pre-Second World War Poland. Between August 1980 and August 1981, Jagielski continued to interact with representatives of Polish workers, though his health was declining during this period. In late July 1981, Jagielski was fired from the Deputy Premiership, reportedly because he failed to produce a recovery program for the economic crisis Poland was experiencing at that time. The same year, he left his membership of the Political Bureau of the Polish United Workers' Party and the Central Committee. He died in Warsaw, Poland from a heart attack at the age of 73.

Early political career Jagielski was born to a peasant family on 12 January 1924, in Kołomyja, Poland (Second Polish Republic) (now Kolomyia, Ukraine ). He spent the Second World War as an agricultural laborer on the farm of his parents. or in 1946 From 1971 to 1981 he was the Polish representative in the Comecon.

Gdańsk negotiations Gdańsk became the focal point of the strike movement. The strikers were represented by the Inter-Enterprise Strike Committee, which was demanding that the workers it represented be given better rights, including better rights to strike. On 26 August meeting with representatives of the strikers at the Lenin Shipyard in Gdańsk, Jagielski promised that the right to strike would be added to a new law on the official trade unions of Poland. After 5 more days of difficult negotiations, a settlement was reached between the strikers and the government, known as the Gdańsk agreement. Norman Davies contends that Jagielski "in the end realised that only two alternatives remained [to a general government victory in the negotiations]-either agreement on the strikers' terms or an immediate resort to force for which the government was not prepared." The agreement, as well as giving the workers of the Lenin Shipyard the right to strike, also allowed them to form their own independent trade union. Jagielski said of the negotiations that led to the agreement, "We have spoken as Poles to Poles...There are no winners and losers. The important thing here is that we have understood each other and the best guarantee for what we have done is hard work." He was reported to have spoken eloquently. — Jagielski recalls how he felt at one point during 23 August 1980, about the strikers at Gdańsk, and the task he had of negotiating with them.

After the Gdańsk negotiations In October 1980, he interacted with a delegation of Solidarity members that included Lech Wałęsa, future President of the Third Republic of Poland. When Wałęsa complained that the Polish government was not keeping to its promise of allowing the independent labour movement enough of an opportunity to publicize itself, Jagielski indicated that he would try to give the movement better access to the Polish press, and to the Polish radio network. That month, the government declared that the poor economy was forcing it to cut back on its promise of ensuring that Polish workers did not have to work on Saturdays, and that it would offer a number of Saturdays as work-free instead.

Unrest grew among Polish workers over the government's decision, and Jagielski negotiated with Wałęsa for six hours in the building of the Council of Ministers regarding the Saturday issue. met with France's President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing, and he was able to gain a pledge of $800 million in aid from France. It seems his offer was rebuffed, and the incident in his life that he spoke of may have been a heart attack he had recently suffered.

Later life and death In July 1981, Jagielski lost his memberships in the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party, the Politburo of the Polish United Workers and the Economic Committee. in Warsaw, Poland, at the age of 73. and said that Jagielski differed in that respect from other Polish politicians in 1980.