A Divided Solidarity Marks Its 10th Year : Poland: Campaign tensions chip away at the party’s once-fierce unity. Some observers see the split as a sign of growing political maturity.

The key figures in Solidarity observed the 10th anniversary Friday of the movement’s founding--not so much a celebration of unity as a parting of the ways.

Union leader Lech Walesa and Prime Minister Tadeusz Mazowiecki, who seem set to oppose each other in the campaign for the Polish presidency, both paid homage to the spirit of 1980 in the Gdansk shipyard where Solidarity was born. It was here that the two men sat side by side and signed the historic Gdansk accords in which the Communist government recognized the East Bloc’s first independent trade union.

But Walesa delivered what could be interpreted as the opening shot of his presidential campaign, still not officially declared despite many strong suggestions that he is preparing to run.

“The revolution,” he declared, “is not yet over.”

Mazowiecki, who is milder by nature, countered, “Let us be political opponents, but never enemies.”

Walesa, taking up a theme sounded by his supporters, that the Mazowiecki government has been too deliberate in initiating changes, said, “We have done a great job, but many things have gone too slowly.”

In a speech Thursday to shipyard workers, Mazowiecki had attempted to deflect the criticism of the Walesa camp.

“This government has not been hindering, is not hindering and will not hinder political changes,” he said. “We have been speeding up, not by arguing but by acting.”

As many Polish political commentators noted in the days preceding the anniversary, the deep split in Solidarity may be a sign of growing political maturity after a period in which the normal divisions in society were papered over by the Communist monolith.

In that context, the division in Solidarity represents a return to a “civil society,” where issues of public policy are openly and sometimes bitterly debated.

There is nostalgia in some quarters for the fierce unity that characterized Solidarity’s decade-long fight against the Communists, a period when Solidarity’s voice was largely Walesa’s. But there are philosophical divisions in the movement, principally among those who advocate a slower and less painful transition to a market system, accompanied by strong social welfare supports, and those who advocate a faster and harder course.

The split has been exacerbated by the role of Walesa, who clearly wants the Polish presidency. Although his goal of winning the office seems more compelling to him than any particular difference with the Mazowiecki government, his complaint that things are moving too slowly in the new Poland is shared by many who complain about the archaic banking system and the government’s seeming inability to deal with telecommunications problems.

Walesa has said he would be the “accelerator” for Poland or would serve as “the ax.”

Mazowiecki’s supporters say Walesa is unpredictable, inconsistent and impetuous, and the government’s spokeswoman, Malgorzata Niezabitowska, has taken to referring to Walesa as “the accelerator with an ax.”

Longtime Solidarity activists complain that Walesa has always had a dictatorial streak as the head of the union, a trait they say they would not want to see in the president.

And while some Poles say they resent the idea that Walesa somehow deserves the presidency for his long years at the forefront of the fight against the Communists, others say his determination, impatience and ability to arouse the nation would indeed speed things up.

Mazowiecki and Walesa met privately for nearly an hour Friday at the shipyards in Gdansk, their first session together since early July, and emerged smiling but with little to say.

There was a brief impasse as the two prepared to get into a car to depart. After a moment, Walesa got in at the front.

“I’ve been in the front of this fight,” he said, “so I will take the front seat.”