Economy milked by Moscow bureaucrats Causes of Poland's collapse

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We publish below extracts from a speech by Marian Rajski, a delegate at Gdynia's Civic Party Conference, on May 16 1981:

Comrades! During recent months I have spent a lot of time reading and listening to practically everything that has appeared in Poland concerning the political crisis in our Party and the reasons for our economic collapse.

I wish to broach a taboo subject about the real reasons for the collapse of our economy.

These reasons are well concealed from the Party and the nation, and on-one has the intention of disclosing them.

The administration has been doing everything not to reveal the causes and has not the slightest intention of removing them. They will do everything to keep the truth from the nation and forestall discussion on the true causes of Poland's economic ruin.

But the Party must deal with this problem, there cannot be matters which, having contributed to the collapse of a wealthy state, should be forbidden discussion in a Marxist-Leninist Party. If there were matters which must remain a taboo then there is no sense in singing the Internationale.

The reasons for our economic collapse rest in specific conditions of the commodity exchange in our foreign trade, and in aspects of an internationalism uncontrolled by an democratic authority. I am not interested in undermining the principle of internationalism or economic integration, but in establishing reasonable limits within which our nation might develop normaily.

I was an ardent advocate of Gierek's economic policies for three-quarters of his term in office, in particular the first five years when a great deal was achieved, more than in any of our five-year plans. Considering that Poland's debt in December 1975 was 3.8 thousand million dollars, while there was a positive balance in the rouble area, is a clear cause for pride.

What happened in 1976, what mechanisms began to steer our economy? The reasons which led a wealthy and industrialised country to economic collapse during two years (1976-77) cannot remain undisclosed. Our economy collapsed in 1977. The following years have been a life of bankruptey and pretence fed by borrowed money. Vice-Premier Jagielski, responsible for economic matters and the obedient executor of the Comecon, drove us to the precipice.

The In the next stage we will lose our independence; is comrade Jagielski counting on this?

What I shall say may appear controversial or provocative. I venture a public expression of these views after a thorough perusal of year-books and professional newspapers over the last ten years.

I can support my case with percentages and figures relating to fureign trade during the last five years. Our foreign trade is arranged so that we buy the means of production, licences food, and a significant proportion of raw materials and semi-finished products with hard currency while we sell the final product for the so-called ''transferable rouble" - which is not a foreign exchange medium of payment.

The procedure was that we counted a commodity, which we had to sell to the USSR according to the quotation of Western exchange, in dollars land the USSR did the same with its products). Then the dollars were MA PAN without Western currency and without worrying about licences and technology. A greater fraud began the moment that principles of partnership were disturbed; when we were forced to export railway carriages, ships and aircraft equipment -manufactured products whose parts we had to purchase in hard currency. Our misfortunes took on a larger dimension in 1976 when we changed over fully to the 'transferable roube" as an accounting unit.

The standard of the rouble has an internal, propagandist, and a touristic value. The history of modern money recognises administrative rates of exchange; but these rates must be equivalent to unrestricted commodity cover, from food and raw materials to manufactured articles and technology. If a currency does not fulfill this condition it becomes a means of robbery, and dependence of the weaker partner on the stronger. As the 'transferable rouble" is not a currency it does not constitute a medium of accumulation of monetary reserves, and has never been transferable or convertible. We cannot use it to pay our debts in the Peoples' Democracies, even though until 1976 we had a positive balance with the USSR.

EVOL For the USSR it is a wonderful tool for conversion of each 62 kopeks into one dollar. The USSR's gain on each dollar is our loss. The naive faith of our government and Party leaders in the 'transferable rouble" is the cause of our economic collapse.

There is one instance where the 'transferable rouble" can be a convertible currency and that is when it is paid to our Comecon ufficials, or diplomats, in Moscow. The holders The next step was Kosygin's visit to Warsaw in 1975. The subject of the discussions was an analysis of the state of co-ordination of the national economic plans for Poland and the USSR for the years 1976-80. In 1977 Comecon's International Bank for Co-operation began operating fully. It is no coincidence that this date is linked with the first year of our downhill economic slide. Our government and Party leaders believed that one dollar was still worth 69 kopeks. Today the dollar is already only worth 62 kopeks.

During the second half of the seventies, IV news depicted a never-ending pilgrimage of Soviet economiets arriving in Warsaw. After every visit the goods, or raw materials, corresponding to the branch of the visiting minister, vanished from our shelves.

His face a mixture of devoted servility and horror, Premier Jaroszewicz just kept on signing. Some of the contracts will remain in force until 1990. After the visit of the Minister for Energy problems arose over coal. Power stations began to receive impure coal that lowered the efficiency of the stations by 15-17%, the same as present shortage of energy. After the visit of the Minister for the Chemical Industry trouble began in the production of artificial fermilizers and in applied chemistry.

Shortage

After the visit of the Health Minister there was a sudden shortage of drugs. After the visit of uniformed economists the integrated electronics factory in Warsaw and Wroclaw's AMNESTY says it has the names of 520 political prisoners reported executed since 1978 and has asked the Iraqi authorities to examine 23 cases of people reported to have died under torture since 1976.

Among the cases cited by Amnesty International, stretching from 1976 to 1981 are:

*A 19-year old Kurd, Reber Mulla Husain, whose mutilated corpse was returned to his family, reportedly with nine nails in the body, one eye gouged out and the penis cut off;

*Hameed 'Ati, a member of the Iraqi Communist Party, who is said to have been beaten with a wire whip while suspended from a rotating ceiling fan and then electrocuted;

*Adnan Abd Al Jabbar, reported to have died in a Baghdad hospital as a result of torture. He is understood to have suffered kidney failure after he was hung upside down, beaten and had a wire inserted up his anus.

In a reply to an appeal by Amnesty for an end to torture, the Iraqi government confirms that verdicts of the country's Revolutionary Court, which can include the death penalty, are not subject to appeal and that hearings are closed to the public.

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