Polish Premier Offers Coalition Cabinet

Prime Minister Tadeusz Mazowiecki submitted nominees for his new government to the Speaker of Poland’s Parliament on Thursday, with eight ministerial portfolios going to Solidarity, four to the Communists and five to be shared by Solidarity’s new coalition allies.

Mazowiecki, weary after days of negotiating to balance Eastern Europe’s first opposition-led government, said the names of his Cabinet selections will be announced Tuesday, when the Parliament is expected to vote on them.

However, lists of the names were in wide circulation among Solidarity deputies in the Sejm, or lower house, as well as members of other groups.

Mazowiecki gave Solidarity, the union movement he has been closely involved with since its formation in 1980, the Foreign Affairs and Finance ministries. He also reserved for it control of the state radio and television, a position that the Communists had fought hard to retain.

Named prime minister two weeks ago, Mazowiecki has been hard pressed in recent days by his Solidarity colleagues to hold down the positions going to the United Peasants Party, whose defection from the Communist camp last month made it possible for Solidarity to form the government.

The Peasants Party, which holds 76 swing votes in the Sejm, had demanded a deputy prime minister post and the Ministry of Agriculture in return for its crossover to Solidarity. On Thursday, Mazowiecki made good on the promise despite a strong protest from representatives of the independent farmers’ union, Rural Solidarity.

In addition, the Peasants Party got the portfolios for the Justice, Environment and Health ministries.

The other crossover group, the Democratic Party, was given the Ministry of Internal Trade and a deputy prime minister who also will head the Office of Technology.

Communists Control Defense

The Communists, following an agreement between Solidarity leader Lech Walesa and President Wojciech Jaruzelski, retained control of the Defense and Interior ministries and were also given the Transport and Foreign Trade ministries.

Gen. Czeslaw Kiszczak, whose attempts as prime minister to form a Communist-led government failed after two weeks, was nominated to fill his previous post as interior minister, heading his nation’s police and security system.

The Communists were also given a deputy prime minister’s post.

Mazowiecki met with Solidarity Sejm and Senate deputies for three hours Thursday night. And although he was being criticized for some of his choices, he was greeted with long applause when he arrived to present his decisions.

“This is a moment of . . . historical significance,” said Bronislaw Geremek, Solidarity’s parliamentary leader, at a news conference after the meeting.

“For the first time, at the head of government in one of the Communist Bloc countries stands a representative of non-Communist forces, and he forms a government which should be a government of transformation for the country,” Geremek said.

He conceded, however, that there are Solidarity complaints.

The most heated dispute was over the Agriculture Ministry. Rural Solidarity representatives argued that Poland’s ailing farm industry should not be handed over to the Peasants Party leadership, which, they pointed out, was allied with the Communists for 40 years. The crisis in Polish agriculture, they argued, stems from Communist mismanagement.

In addition to the Finance and Foreign Affairs ministries, Solidarity will head Labor, Education, Building, Industry, Local Government and Culture.

For the prestigious post of foreign minister, Mazowiecki was said to have nominated Krysztof Skubiszewski, an independent expert in international law who has served as an adviser on foreign relations to Cardinal Jozef Glemp, the Roman Catholic primate of Poland.