Quick Facts
Biography
Antoni Macierewicz (Polish pronunciation: [anˈtɔɲi mat͡ɕɛˈrɛvit͡ʂ]; born August 3, 1948) is the Minister of National Defence for Poland. He previously served as the Minister of Internal Affairs, Head of the Military Counterintelligence Service, and Minister of State in the Ministry of National Defence. An academic, historian, and human rights activist, Macierewicz was one of the leaders of the anti-communist resistance in Poland.
Employing nonviolent civil disobedience, Macierewicz was one of the founders in 1976 of the Workers' Defense Committee, a major anti-communist opposition organization that was a forerunner of Solidarity. During the 1980s Macierewicz directed the Centre for Social Research of Solidarity and was one of the trade union's key advisors. A former political prisoner, he escaped from incarceration and was in hiding until 1984, directing work and issuing underground publications.
Macierewicz served as the Minister of Internal Affairs from 1991 to 1992, and the Head of the Military Counterintelligence Service from 2006 to 2007. He is currently in his sixth term in the Parliament of Poland, where he represents the Piotrków Trybunalski district, and was a Member of the European Parliament. He is also the Deputy Leader of Law and Justice, the largest party in the Parliament of Poland. Since November 16, 2015 Macierewicz is the Minister of National Defence.
A historian of Latin America and Poland, Macierewicz has been on faculty at the University of Warsaw and Jagiellonian University.
Early life
Macierewicz was born in Warsaw on August 3, 1948. He is the youngest of three children of Zdzisław and Maria Macierewicz, both scientists. His father, a noted researcher in chemistry, a soldier in the Home Army during World War II, and a member of the Christian Democratic Labor Party, was murdered by the Ministry of Public Security in 1949.
Anti-communist activities
Macierewicz was expelled from Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski High School for political reasons in 1965, specifically for refusing to denounce the Letter of Reconciliation of the Polish Bishops to the German Bishops. Macierewicz continued his studies at Maria Konopnicka High School. From 1966, he belonged to the Czarna Jedynka scout troop. After completing his baccalaureate exams, he became a student at the University of Warsaw in 1966. He co-organized underground student organizations and participated in the student strikes that marked the 1968 Polish political crisis. He was arrested and remained a political prisoner from March 28 to August 3, 1968. Following the Polish 1970 protests, Macierewicz launched the campaign to help victims of state oppression. In 1971 he earned a Master's degree from the Institute of History of the University of Warsaw. His thesis was titled Hierarchy of Power and the Structure of Land Ownership in Tawantinsuyu in the First Half of the Sixteenth Century’’.
As a doctoral student at the Institute of History of the Polish Academy of Sciences, he developed expertise on South America, but his doctoral thesis was not considered for political reasons. Subsequently, he coordinated with other independent intellectuals, writing letters of protest to the government regarding changes in the constitution of the Polish People's Republic. He taught the history of Latin America at the Department of Iberian Studies of the University of Warsaw. During this time he published articles and learned Quechuan languages. In January 1976 he started a PhD under the supervision of Tadeusz Łepkowski, which was interrupted by the authorities in mid-October 1976 because of Macierewicz’s dissident activities. Moreover, publication of his book and a trip to Argentina in order to conduct archival research were both blocked.
After the pacification of workers in June 1976, he organized relief in Radom and Ursus. Along with some of his colleagues from "Black One", he created underground structures, which dealt with the monetary, legal, and medical aid for the oppressed. Macierewicz founded the Workers' Defence Committee (KOR), the forerunner of Solidarity. “Macierewicz, more than anyone else, was responsible for the formation of KOR”, notes David Ost, a Professor of Political Science at Hobart and William Smith Colleges.
In September 1976 he co-authored the organization's first appeal and began publishing the Komunikat „KOR”, working closely with Piotr Naimski and Jan Olszewski. From May 16 to July 23, 1977, and again in December 1979, Macierewicz was held as a political prisoner. In 1977 he started Głos, one of the first magazines of the democratic opposition in the communist era. In October 1979 he was a member of the Solidarity hunger strike at the Holy Cross Church in Warsaw. In connection with his opposition activities, he was kept under surveillance by the security services of communist Poland and, from 1976 until 1980, he was detained at least 23 times and his residence regularly searched.
From September 1980, Macierewicz directed the Centre for Social Research of Solidarity. He also began to publish the independent newspaper News Day Warsaw. Since October 1980 he was a member of the National Coordination Committee of Advisors, and later the National Commission of Solidarity. On September 27, 1981, Macierewicz was one of the signatories of the founding declaration of Independence Service Clubs. In the autumn of 1981, he joined the faculty at the Jagiellonian University. After the introduction of martial law in Poland, Macierewicz was part of the strike committee at the Gdańsk Shipyard. After the pacification of the protest of December 16, 1981, he was arrested but escaped from prison. Macierewicz was in hiding until 1984, directing work and issuing underground publications.
Political career
Member of the Sejm
Macierewicz remains a Member of the Sejm, where he has served from November 25, 1991 to May 31, 1993, from October 20, 1997 to October 18, 2005, and from November 5, 2007 to present. He represents the Piotrków Trybunalski district. He is the Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee for the Investigation of the Causes of the 2010 Polish Air Force Tu-154 Crash. Macierewicz is also a member of the National Defense Commission and the Subcommission for the Polish Defense Industry and Technical Modernization of the Armed Forces.
Minister of Internal Affairs
He was Minister of Internal Affairs in Jan Olszewski's government. As a minister responsible for the police and security services, he was afforded full access to the former communist documentary archives, including records of communist intelligence and secret service agents. On May 28, 1992, the Parliament of Poland passed a law that the Minister of Internal Affairs had to provide the Sejm with a list of then senators, representatives, ministers, voivodes, judges and prosecutors who had been secret communist agents between 1945 and 1990. On June 4, 1992, Macierewicz provided a list, commonly known as the Macierewicz List, of 64 members of the government and parliament that had been identified as secret agents in the archives of the communist secret police to the Convent of Senior Parliamentarians. He also provided a second list containing the 2 names of highest importance, that of than President Lech Wałęsa and Marshall of Sejm Wiesław Chrzanowski.
As the crisis had been unfolding, prior to the lists' presentation, on May 29, 1992 the opposition parties submitted a motion of no confidence, asking for a vote on the fate of Olszewski's government. On the night of June 4, 1992, after the presentation of the lists, the motion of no confidence passed and Olszewski's government was dismissed. This situation was depicted in a documentary film, Nocna zmiana.
Activity between government posts
In 1992 Macierewicz founded his own party, Polish Action. He joined Olszewski’s party, the Movement for Reconstruction of Poland, and became his deputy in 1996. He ran for parliament on Olszewski’s party ticket. In 1997 he founded the Catholic-National Movement. In 2001 he joined the League of Polish Families, and on its list was re-elected to parliament in 2001, but left them due to policy differences. In 2002 Macierewicz ran unsuccessfully for President of Warsaw.
Member of the European Parliament
Macierewicz was a Member of the European Parliament during the fifth term. He served on the Committee on Development and Cooperation.
Secretary of State in the Ministry of National Defence
Following the 2005 Polish parliamentary election, Macierewicz was selected by Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński for the post of Secretary of State in the Ministry of National Defence.
Chairman of the Verification Commission
In July 2006, Macierewicz was appointed as the Chairman of the Verification Commission. He led the liquidation of the Military Information Services, a vestige of the communist era. Macierewicz also established new intelligence and counterintelligence agencies. On 16 February 2007 the closure report, known as the Macierewicz Report, was published in the Polish Monitor.
In its analysis, global intelligence company Stratfor noted:
The move both removes Soviet influence and consolidates the twins' power in the government. The release of the WSI report is one of the largest and most decisive moves along these lines. By naming people in the WSI who are connected to Soviet intelligence, Kaczynski ensures their names will forever be known for — alleged or real — Soviet ties. The move undermines the entire structure of the WSI and all of its former personnel, ensuring that it and those attached to it can never recover.
Head of the Military Counterintelligence Service
In October 2006, Macierewicz became Head of the Military Counterintelligence Service, in office until the end of the Kaczyński government.
Polish Air Force Tu-154 crash investigation
Since July 20, 2010 Macierewicz is the Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee for the Investigation of the Causes of the 2010 Polish Air Force Tu-154 crash, commonly known as the Macierewicz Commission. Established on July 8, 2010, its goal is to prepare a full account of the circumstances surrounding the crash, which killed President of Poland Lech Kaczyński and his wife Maria, and 94 other dignitaries en route to the 70th anniversary commemorations of the Katyń massacre. The committee was also mandated to provide recommendations regarding the prevention of aviation accidents and incidents. The committee was created in accordance with parliamentary legislation. It issues reports and hears extensive testimony from experts. On June 29–30, 2011 the committee published "Biała Księga Smoleńskiej Tragedii" (White Book of Smolensk Tragedy), where some 170,000 documents were published on their websites and 19 causes of the crash presented. As the state investigation moved to exhumation of President Kaczyński's and others' bodies in late 2016, the New York Times summarized that "Macierewicz claimed over the years to have 'irrefutable evidence' of explosives [having caused the crash, but] his experts have yet to produce it."
Deputy Leader of Law and Justice
Since November 23, 2013, Macierewicz has been the Deputy Leader of Law and Justice, the largest party in the Parliament of Poland.
Minister of National Defence
Macierewicz became Poland's Minister of National Defence on November 16, 2015.
Honors and Awards
On May 3, 1990, Ryszard Kaczorowski, then President of Poland in exile, awarded Macierewicz the Order of Polonia Restituta, one of Poland's highest orders. News magazine Gazeta Polska named Macierewicz the 2010 Man of the Year.
Controversies
In 2006 Macierewicz published a list of members of the WSI (military intelligence service), which included dozens of current and former agents, some active in highly sensitive places like Afghanistan. The Polish ambassadors to Austria, China, Kuwait and Turkey were recalled to Warsaw. At least ten of the names, including the military attaché in Moscow, were fiercely contested.
Following Macierewicz’s designation as Minister of National Defence, he faced allegations of anti-Semitism and protests by the Anti Defamation League. In a radio interview in 2002 Macierewicz said, in response to a caller’s question, that he had read the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Krzysztof Izdebski, the Chairman of the Council of The Union of Jewish Communities, declared, “[Macierewicz] accepts with no doubts that the Protocols were false…We appreciate that accusations of being anti-Semitic are quickly met with the proper response which proves that there is a general attitude of condemning anti-Semitism.” Justin Schulberg, a Jewish American former legislative assistant to Macierewicz and a student leader at Rutgers University, stated, “As a Jewish American, I am outraged by false and outlandish rumors and innuendos accusing Antoni Macierewicz, Poland’s Minister of National Defence-designate, of antisemitism…I hope that all factions in Poland will forcefully condemn the use of Judaism for political infighting.” Anna Chipczynska, the President of the Jewish Community of Warsaw, said, "the latest statement by Mr. Macierewicz denouncing all forms of anti-Semitism could be a positive signal that the new Polish government will stand strongly against manifestations of hatred toward Jews."
Macierewicz paid an official visit to Israel in April 2016. Macierewicz and Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon pledged to strengthened military cooperation between Poland and Israel. Macierewicz was criticized in the Polish press during the 2016 Warsaw summit for his support of the defense industry of Israel. In October 2016 Macierewicz was condemn by Gazeta Wyborcza for his association with a leading champion of the fight to restore assets from Swiss banks to Holocaust survivors.
In July 2016, Antoni Macierewicz said that the "real enemy", Russia, shares responsibility for the massacres of Poles and Jews in German-occupied Volhynia and Eastern Galicia by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA). Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that "the Polish government is moving from Russophobia to inciting national hatred," and asked Macierewicz if "there are any historical events and natural disasters for which Russia is not the one to blame." Macierewicz's claim was also criticized by the Federation of Jewish Communities of Russia.