Polish farm leader fears winter famine

Press, 26 November 1981, Page 8

Polish farm leader fears winter famine

NZPA-Reuter Warsaw Students, farmers and oil workers staged strikes and protests in Poland yesterday as pressure mounted on the Communists Government to hold Tree local elections. Leaders of the Independent Students’ Union said at least 73 of the country’s universities and colleges were on strike to force the rector of an engineering college to resign and to back a new liberal education law. Farmers staged occupation strikes in three parts of Poland and were reported to be restive on the eve of talks with the Government after a warning by Rural Solidarity’s leader, Jan Kulaj, that Poland could face famine this winter. Some 1700 oil workers in

Krosno, southeast Poland began an indefinite strike yesterday to back demands that their enterprise should be turned into a self-managed, profit-making business local Solidarity officials said. In Warsaw, Solidarity’s news bulletin began publishing excerpts from a grassroots draft for a new election law. The draft called for obligatory secret balloting, a big departure from the. voting procedures prevalent in Communist East Europe. The Warsaw newspaper, “Zycie Warszawy” yesterday quoted Mr Kulaj as saying that the elections, censorship and other political causes had overshadowed what he called the most vital national issue. “These are all important

matters, but somehow there is no discussion about bread and the people who produce it,” he said. “In the months to come Polish society is threatened by famine and by an even greater economic disaster over the next few years,” Mr Kulaj said. In Brussels, the European Economic Community yesterday agreed to give Poland about $l2 million in emergency aid to help ease worsening food shortages. In Warsaw, the Polish leader, General Wojciech Jaruzelski, yesterday discussed “training and battle readiness” of his Army with the Warsaw Pact Commander (Marshal Viktor Kulikov) the Polish news agency, Pap reported.