Gazeta Wyborcza

Gazeta Wyborcza was established in accordance with the arrangements of the Round Table,[21][22] as a press organ of the Solidarity Civic Committee in the election campaign before the parliamentary elections in 1989.[23] Initially, the daily was to be called Gazeta Codzienna, and the adjective "election" was to function only during the election campaign  . The first eight-page issue was published on May 8, 1989, in a circulation of 150,000 copies.[24]

Gazeta Wyborcza was first published on 8 May 1989,[25] under the rhyming masthead motto, "Nie ma wolności bez Solidarności" ("There's no freedom without Solidarity"). The founders were Andrzej Wajda, Aleksander Paszyński and Zbigniew Bujak.[26] Its founding was an outcome of the Polish Round Table Agreement between the communist government of the People's Republic of Poland and political opponents centred on the Solidarity movement. It was initially owned by Agora SA.[27] Later the American company Cox Communications partially bought the daily.[27]

The paper was to serve as the voice of the Solidarity movement during the run-up to the 1989 parliamentary elections (hence its title). As such, it was the first legal newspaper published outside the government's control since its founding of regime in the late 1940s.

It was prepared by 20 journalists, most previously associated with the underground weekly Tygodnik Mazowsze. Michnik convinced Wałęsa to name him the editor-in-chief.[24][28] Helena Łuczywo and Ernest Skalski became Michnik's deputies.[24] The first editorial office was located in a former kindergarten in Mokotów.[29]

According to the editors, the first edition was small (150,000 copies) and relatively expensive due to the limited supplies of paper made available by the government. A year and a half later, the daily run had reached 500,000 copies. In September 1990, during the breakup of the Solidarity camp following the collapse of the communist government, Wałęsa revoked the paper's right to use the Solidarity logo on its masthead.[30] Since then, the Gazeta Wyborcza has been an independent newspaper broadly aligned with the centre-left and liberal position.[31]

Adam Michnik in 1991.

After the Round Table talks during the presidential crisis, on July 3, 1989, an article by Michnik, with the headline: "Your president, our prime minister," where he opted for the election of the president on the recommendation of the Polish United Workers' Party and at the same time entrusting the mission of forming a government to a representative of the "Solidarity,"[32] postulating "an alliance of the democratic opposition with the reformist wing of the ruling camp." This proposal is currently interpreted as a proof of sensing the aspirations of the Solidarity camp to take over more power than was agreed at the Round Table,[33] but officially met with opposition.[24] Nevertheless, it was actually implemented: while Wojciech Jaruzelski, the current First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party, took over the position of president, the opposition, thanks to the votes of former allies of the communist party, formed the first non-communist government in Eastern Europe with Tadeusz Mazowiecki as prime minister.[34][35]

From the second half of 1989, the environment concentrated in the editorial office of Wyborcza sympathized with the government of Tadeusz Mazowiecki , and at the same time was in conflict with the representatives of Tygodnik Solidarność.[24] These antagonisms correlated with the political conflict known as the "War on the Mountain", during which Wałęsa allied himself with the Civic Committee faction represented by the brothers Lech and Jarosław Kaczyński against Mazowiecki.[32][36] Adam Michnik supported the Prime Minister's environment, as a result of which, in September 1990, the National Commission of "Solidarity" adopted a resolution aimed at taking away Wyborcza the right to place the "Solidarity" stamp on the vignette. It was argued that "the bias of articles aimed at discrediting and ridiculing the chairman of Lech Wałęsa" and explaining that " Gazeta is not an information organ of "S", but a private company."

At that time, Tygodnik Solidarność, whose editor-in-chief at the time was Jarosław Kaczyński,[37] published columns by columnists such as Romuald Szeremietiew,[38] who accused the newspaper of manipulating information, including concealing events . As a result, the daily lost the right to use the union's logo and the slogan "There is no freedom without Solidarity". In addition, Wałęsa demanded the dismissal of Michnik (since July 1990 belonging to the Movement of Citizens, Democratic Action party ) from the post of editor-in-chief. Michnik resigned, but his resignation was not accepted by the members of the editorial office, and therefore he remained in office.[24] A group of former oppositionists associated with Lech Wałęsa left the editorial office, which was the result of a dispute within the editorial office with a group of post-Solidarity circles representing different views.[39]

In 2003, Lew Rywin, a prominent Polish film producer, was accused by the Gazeta Wyborcza of attempted bribery after he had allegedly solicited a bribe of $17.5 million from the editor Adam Michnik in exchange for amendments to a draft media legislation. The adoption of the draft law in the government's original form would have prevented Agora S.A. from purchasing Polsat, one of Poland's private TV stations. The case, dubbed the Rywin affair, led to an official inquiry by the Polish Parliament. Consequently, Lew Rywin was sentenced for attempting to influence the parliamentary legislative process aimed at enabling a Polish media company to buy a television station. The controversial draft legislation ended up being rejected by the Polish parliament.