POZNAN (Poland): Pawel Pawlak, who was seven when Poland’s Solidarity trade union was born, now spends his time doing what the movement’s founders did 25 years ago — telling fellow workers not to be afraid and to get organized.

The difference is that then union activists who defied communist authorities risked arrest and persecution. Today, Poland’s 18 per cent unemployment rate — the highest in the European Union — keeps a lid on worker discontent.

“People are afraid of losing their jobs and many don’t believe unions can do anything for them,” said Pawlak, who started a Solidarity chapter in the Portuguese-owned Biedronka (Ladybird) supermarket chain in the western city of Poznan.

The retailer, which is owned by Portugal’s Jeronimo Martins and employs around 12,000 workers in Poland, came under the spotlight when a former employee sued the company for unpaid overtime, citing abusive work practices.

Supermarket saleswoman Bozena Lopacka became a cause celebre with some newspapers comparing her to Lech Walesa, Solidarity’s iconic leader who helped topple communism 15 years ago.

Call it the Polish paradox.

Solidarity, which paved the way for Poland’s transition to democracy and a market economy, became a victim of its own success and as a trade union ended up weakened and marginalized.

Now, as the union prepares to celebrate the 25th anniversary of its creation next week, it has coined a new slogan: ‘No dignity without Solidarity’, a play on the original motto from the 1980s ‘No freedom without Solidarity’.

“It’s all about people’s dignity. In 1980 and 1981, Solidarity sought to give people back their dignity by fighting for freedom,” said Solidarity chief Janusz Sniadek.

“Today the goal is to defend their dignity by fighting against violations of workers’ rights,” he said.

The economic reforms brought in after communism hit traditional strongholds of union power in heavy industries.

The thriving private sector, which accounts for 70 per cent of Poland’s output and jobs, has remained largely off-limits.

“The private sector is generally hostile to unions and many managements try to keep them out,” said Juliusz Gardawski, industrial relations sociologist at the Warsaw School of Economics.

Last year, only one Polish employee in five belonged to a trade union, one of the lowest ratios in Europe and well below the European Union average of around 30 per cent, a survey by CBOS pollster showed.

Solidarity, whose membership has been falling by four per cent a year to now stand at 700,000 or five per cent of the workforce, has tried to fight back.

It has pinned its hopes on young activists like Pawlak, who has recruited 300 members at Biedronka in Poznan, to spearhead its push into rapidly expanding sectors like retailing.

“Because of historic necessity the union, perhaps too much, has engaged itself in politics, but this chapter is closed. Now we return to typical activities for a trade union,” said Sniadek.

Rank-and-file union members say Solidarity’s legends and slogans have no appeal for young workers, many of whom share with managers a deep distrust of trade unions.

“Most of the people I work with weren’t even born in 1980. They know very little about Solidarity or trade unions and many view them as something destructive,” says Pawlak.

Many young employees associate unions with violent protests by industrial workers, like the demonstrations by miners over pensions last month.

Young activists say Solidarity has also been tainted by its support for the 1997-2001 centre-right coalition, which disintegrated in the final year of its term.

Krzysztof Zgoda is charged with reversing these negative impressions. He says the only way to improve the union’s standing is to go back to basics, offering help where it is most needed.

He runs a scheme in which union organizers criss-cross the country, meeting hundreds of workers, often in secret, to help set up unions, sometimes in firms where they are not welcome.

Such efforts are beginning to pay off and Solidarity now has chapters in Poland’s seven biggest hypermarket chains.

Membership, albeit still low at some 3,000 out of 120,000 workers in the hypermarkets, is also slowly rising.

Zgoda says Solidarity must brace for a long march unlike the meteoric rise of the 1980s when it quickly grew into a grassroots movement of 10 million.

A recent cooperation agreement with British supermarket chain Tesco is a case in point.

“It took us three years, but unions in Britain needed 43 years to get such a deal, so we are doing pretty well,” Zgoda said.—Reuters