Free Election

In a spirit of partisan exuberance tempered with terror, Poland approached its first nationwide popular election, ten days hence. By last week most of the combined opposition (Socialist and Polish Peasant Party) candidates had been jailed, and their supporters more or less completely cowed by the secret police, by striking their names from voting lists and by arrest. The Communist-dominated Government ventured to predict an "overwhelming" victory. According to the Potsdam Agreement, the Polish elections must be absolutely free and secret.

Stanislaw Mikolajczyk, Vice Premier and leader of the combined opposition, gave the number of imprisoned candidates as 104. The National Electoral Commission rejected appeals to free the candidates, "because it is a matter for the security authorities."

Mikolajczyk also cited the case of opposition candidate Jan Malejko, whose mutilated body was found in a field near his house after a nocturnal visit by three militiamen. The security police had previously ordered him to withdraw his candidacy. The bodies of 23 other murdered opposition candidates have been found. Eight murdered Communist workers were also recently discovered.

Government censorship does not permit the opposition to print any news about the murders of its candidates. Editors have sometimes been hard put to it to fill blank spaces, since the Government does not permit newspapers to show evidences of censorship.

Unfederated Republic. The activities of the security police in the election campaign suggest that Poland is almost as much an unfederated Soviet republic as Yugoslavia. The UB (security force) is modeled after (and trained by) Russia's MVD. The chief is Stanislaw Radkiewicz, former schoolteacher and longtime Communist. When his assistant, Stanislaw Vachowicz, a Socialist, complained of the UB's activities, he was forced to resign. When Premier Edward Osubka-Morawski, Socialist stooge of the Communists, protested about the UB in Cabinet meetings, he was told to mind his knitting.

The security police are believed to number some 170,000 full-time employes, some 20,000 more men than there are in the regular army. Between 50 and 60 thousand are engaged in routine snooping and spying. The rest are mobilized in flying squads for mass arrests or operations against the "underground." The underground, official label for practically any group that opposes the Government, is also the official excuse for UB activities. The secret police may arrest without warrant anyone in Poland except district secretaries and higher officials of the Communist Party.

Nominally the secret police are responsible to the Polish Parliament and Cabinet. Since the Parliament has proved a willing tool of the Communist ruling group, the UB is responsible to three Russian-trained Communist Cabinet members and Poland's No. I Communist: Jakub Berman, Under Secretary of State Without Portfolio and Secretary of the Cabinet, who has the last word on foreign affairs; Hilary Minc, Minister of Industry; Colonel Roman Zambrowski, vice director of the political department of the Foreign Ministry and a member of the six-man Presidium of the National Council; and Wladislaw Gomulka, Secretary General of the Polish Communist Party.

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