Edward Gierek

Edward Gierek was a Polish communist politician. Gierek replaced Wadysaw Gomuka as First Secretary of the ruling Polish United Workers Party in the Polish Peoples Republic. Gierek is known for opening communist Poland to Western influence and for his economic reform, based on foreign loans, which ultimately failed. He was removed from power after labor strikes led to the Gdask Agreement between the communist state and workers of the emerging Solidarity free trade union movement.

Edward Gierek was born in Porbka near Sosnowiec, into a coal mining family. He lost his father to a mining accident in a pit at the age of four. His mother remarried and emigrated to northern France, where he lived from the age ofand worked in a coal mine from the age of 13. Gierek joined the French Communist Party in 1931 and in 1934 was deported to Poland for organizing a strike. After completing compulsory military service in Stryi in southeastern Poland , Gierek married Stanisawa Jdrusik, but was unable to find employment. The Giereks went to Belgium, where Edward worked in the coal mines of Waterschei, acquiring pneumoconiosis . In 1939 Gierek joined the Communist Party of Belgium. During the German occupation, he participated in communist antiNazi Belgian resistance activities. After the war Gierek was politically active, primarily among Polish immigrants. He was a cofounder of the Belgian branch of the Polish Workers Party and a chairman of the National Council of Poles in

Source: Wikipedia