Walesa Faces Slander Trial for Disputing Voter Turnout Figure
Solidarity founder Lech Walesa will stand trial for slander because he questioned official reports of the turnout in the Polish election last October, a government spokesman said today.
Walesa was questioned by a state prosecutor in December for saying the actual turnout in the Oct. 13 parliamentary election was only 60%, far less than the 79% reported by election officials.
“The investigation (of Walesa’s case) is ended,” government spokesman Jerzy Urban said at a weekly news conference. “It is now being discussed which court should handle the trial. Then the date will be set.”
Urban said “it would not be in the interest of the country” to make a martyr of Walesa, the founder of the Solidarity free trade union whose growing effectiveness led to the imposition of martial law in 1981.
But, he said, “the government has nothing to do with this affair. Election committees felt slandered by Walesa because he questioned the proper counting of votes.”
If convicted, the 42-year-old father of eight could be sent to prison for up to two years.
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