EUROPE: Poland's Pension Cuts - Cue for Former Eastern Bloc

• by Pavol Stracancsky (warsaw)
• Sunday, February 07, 2010
• Inter Press Service

Starting January, Poland slashed the monthly payments of as many as 40,000 communist-era police officers, border guards, prison wardens and other state workers by an average of more than half.

Polish rights groups have praised the legislation as providing 'justice' to victims of the former communist regime in the country, some of whom have been forced to live in poverty while former communist officials draw, in some cases, pensions of almost 2,000 euros (2,727 US dollars) per month - four times the national average.

Now campaigners in the former communist bloc want to see similar legislation in their own countries.

Jan Palfy, spokesman for the Institute of National Memory in Slovakia which documents crimes of the communist regime, told IPS: 'This is something which would be very welcome in Slovakia. For former communist secret police agents to get much larger pension payments than ordinary people is wrong and unfair. There is no reason for it.'

Across the former Eastern bloc victims of the communist regimes remain bitter that not only have those who persecuted, and in some cases tortured, them never been brought to justice for their crimes, but have in many cases been able to retire and live far more comfortably than ordinary people ever will.

In Poland, Wojciech Jaruzelski, the military general who oversaw the infamous imposition of martial law in 1981 and the crushing of the Solidarity movement, had along with others involved been collecting pensions worth almost 1,800 euros (2,454 dollars) a month.

In Germany there has been a bitter debate for years over the size of state payouts to victims of the communist regime compared to the often relatively large pensions paid to the people who once ran it.

In the years following the fall of the communist regime and the reunification of Germany, bitterness grew among victims that retired communist police and officials were getting large unemployment payouts while successive governments appeared reluctant to address compensation for them.

In 2007 the German parliament passed legislation giving victims a pension of 250 euros (340 dollars) as compensation.But it is only available to people jailed by the Stasi - the secret police force in then East Germany which spied on, persecuted, tortured and assassinated dissidents and ordinary citizens - for more than six months and who earn less than 12,500 euros (17,407) dollars) a year.

Experts and victims' support groups have claimed that the amount is almost derisory while former Stasi officers and high-ranking communist officials are often paid pensions at least four times as much.

German media have reported that while the victims' payouts cost the state around 35 million euros (47.7 million dollars) per year, the pensions paid to former high ranking communist officials approach almost two billion euros (2.72 billion dollars).

Margot Honecker, widow of the former East German head-of-state Erich Honecker and the education minister in her husband's communist regime, who was accused of overseeing the forced adoption of children of dissidents who had been arrested or had fled the country, reportedly collects 1,500 euros (2,045 dollars) per month while living in exile in Chile.

Hubertus Knabe, scientific director of the Berlin-Hohenschönhausen Memorial, a Stasi prison now converted into a museum, told German media: 'If you were a guard [here], you get a good pension. That is unjust and victims feel very bitter about this.'

There is anger among some victims - many of whom live in the poorest areas of the reunified Germany - that many of the former Stasi staff have managed to find lucrative work today which will pay them large pensions when they retire soon.

Last year, research by Berlin's Free University, which specialises in studies of East German communist rule, showed that up to 17,000 former Stasi staff were still working in the civil service, police forces and state criminal investigation bodies in East German states. Both professions provide high pension pay-outs on retirement.

The situation is the same elsewhere in Eastern Europe.

The Romanian Historic Studies Society (SSIR) began last month a campaign to have the pensions of former Romanian Securitate secret police cut. The group says ex-Securitate officers receive pensions up to three times the national average.

In Slovakia, many former officers of the then Czechoslovak StB secret police live a relatively comfortable life in retirement. While the national average pension payout is 330 euros (450 dollars) per month, former StB staff receive up to 800 euros (1,091 dollars ) - almost 100 euros (136 dollars ) more than the average monthly wage.

When the communist regime fell, a lack of qualified staff meant some communist officials and StB workers were retained to help as the state transformed into a new, democratic regime. In doing so, they became eligible for higher pension payouts.

Meanwhile, the maximum paid out to any former political prisoner is 700 euros (954 dollars), and that is only if they were jailed for ten years or more. Others receive as little as half that amount.

In the Czech Republic, retired StB officers receive lower pensions. But they still get as much as that of the average citizen - 400 euros (545 dollars) per month.

Some MPs are already considering legislation to redress the balance. In Slovakia both government and opposition party MPs have said they want to address what they describe as unjust pension payments for former secret service officers and political prisoners.

Critics of the new Polish law say that it unfairly punishes people who were not guilty of any crimes.

Former communists and current left-wing politicians have already taken legal action, claiming the move is unconstitutional. Poland's Constitutional Court was due to rule on the case last month but delayed judgment after judges failed to agree.

It is unclear when a ruling will be made by the court but Polish media have said it could be months. Until then the new law remains in effect.

MPs for the Democratic Left Alliance, the successor to the Communist Party, argue the law is unconstitutional because it does not identify individuals with specific crimes and imposes collective guilt. But rights campaigners in the country remain convinced the law is a 'just' legislation which will be welcomed by victims of the communist regime.

Janusz Kochanowski, the country's ombudsman for citizens' rights, told Polish media: 'It is a law with principles of decency and justice. It cannot be that criminals receive higher pensions for their crimes while at the same time their victims are living in poverty.'

© Inter Press Service (2010) — All Rights ReservedOriginal source: Inter Press Service