National Party "Fatherland"

After the Polish Round Table Agreement and end of the communist period in Poland, Polish nationalist circled united to form National Party (Polish: Stronnictwo Narodowe, SN) in 1989, which was a reactivation of an interwar national conservative party of the same name - National Party. The party was then formally registered in 1990 and restarted political activities. In the 1991 Polish parliamentary election, National Party won 74.082 votes equating to 0.66% of the popular vote. Shortly after the 1991 election, the party grew divided as notable factions and tendencies formed within it.^[7]

Amongst the growing sectionalism, two 'tendencies' were particularly notable - the "blue" faction and the "pink" faction. The blue camp represented the traditional right and aspired to closely mimic the pre-war National Party, including supporting fully capitalist liberalism economy and rejecting the Polish communist period. In contrast, the 'pink camp' was considered a left-wing deviation, criticizing the blue party's line as being elitist and too clerical. The pink faction sought to focus on socio-economic issues and advocated state-owned economy, together with an expansive welfare state. In February, Bogusław Rybicki, the leader of the pink faction, was expelled from the National Party, after being accused of being a communist civil servant. Several other activists of the party left the party in solidarity with Rybacki, and on 28 March 1992, they found National Party "Fatherland", which was to be a left-wing equivalent of the National Party.^[7]

The party held its national convention in Warsaw, where Bogusław Rybicki and Bogusław Jeznach were elected as the leaders of the party. By 1993, the party's organisational network already covered 42 provinces. The number of Ojczyzna members was around 2100 at the time. The circulation of the party's newspaper, the weekly Ojczyzna - rose from 3,500 to 6,000 copies within a year. The party started holding events, consisting mainly of anniversary celebrations, but also street protests and paramilitary training.^[3]

The party sought to run in the 1993 Polish parliamentary election. The party hold talks with Self-Defence of the Republic of Poland (Polish: Samoobrona Rzeczpospolitej Polskiej, commonly referred to as Samoobrona) in hopes of organizing an electoral coalition. Samoobrona was a far-left party;^[8] it became popular through its radical and aggressive agrarian protests, forming a paramilitary group "Peasant Battalions" (Polish: Bataliony Chłopskie), referring to a Polish agrarian WW2-era resistance movement of the same name, which protected farmers against bailiffs, evictions and police.^[9]

Samoobrona and its radical leader, Andrzej Lepper, gained widespread attention through controversial statements such as "We are a radical party, open to all disadvantaged people who are starving at home." and "If someone has a billion or two or ten, they really couldn't have made it through legal work" became widely reported and known."^[9] It had an unclear ideological profile - Polish political scientist Jarosław Tomasiewicz described it as a "radical-populist" party combined agrarianism, nationalism and "Soviet-style" communism.^[10]

Idiosyncratic views of Samoobrona, combined with their populism, left-wing nationalism and radicalism, were appealing to the National Party "Fatherland", which represented a left-wing splinter from a right-wing, radically nationalist party. Despite Rybicki's efforts, Samoobrona rejected the idea of cooperating with his National Party. Samoobrona would later drift further left and cooperate with more clearly left-wing parties through Social Alliance.^[11]

After the unsuccessful attempt to form a coalition with Samoobrona, the party decided to run in the election on its own, but open itself to cooperation with independent candidates and minor organizations through creating Fatherland - Polish List. This also allowed the party to distance itself from the 'main' National Party, which the party members considered too radical, especially in the wake of its 1991 electoral performance. Fatherland - Polist List was formally registered on 30 June 1993.^[3] It was located in Warsaw.^[1] However, the electoral bloc was undermined by the creation of Catholic Electoral Committee "Fatherland" (Polish: Katolicki Komitet Wyborczy "Ojczyzna", KKW) in July. The KKW was led by National-Catholic Christian National Union and was a coalition of Christian-democratic and political-Catholic parties. It was largely based on the Catholic Electoral Action, a coalition from the 1991 Polish parliamentary election with similar program and purpose.^[3]

However, unlike the Catholic Electoral Action, which was staunchly right-wing and National-Catholic, the Catholic Electoral Committee "Fatherland" sought to present itself as a moderate party and build a broad coalition of both churchgoing and moderate Catholics. The committee sought an official endorsement from the Polish Catholic Church, but the Church strongly emphasized its neutrality, a decision influenced by the controversy caused by the clergy's alleged support for the Catholic Electoral Action in 1991. In light of this, the KKW organized through parish councils instead.^[12]

The Catholic Electoral Committee "Fatherland" not only had an almost identical name to Fatherland - Polish List. National Party "Fatherland" and its allies strongly protested the "theft" of its committee and filed a lawsuit against the Catholic committee, but they were unable to hamper the KKW.^[3] Ultimately, Fatherland - Polish List performed terribly in the 1993 election, receiving only 15.958 votes, which equated 0.12% of the popular vote.^[6]

After its disappointing performance in the 1993 election, the party started rapidly declining. The party leadership attempted to revive the party by presenting itself as "revisionist-nationalist" party, hoping to recruit new members and develop an attractive ideological life. The Unification Congress of National Organisations was held in April 1994, where a couple of tiny political groupings joined the National Party "Fatherland". However, despite the merger, the paty kept declining - members withdrew from party activity or deserted to other groupings, including Samoobrona.^[3]

In 1995, Bogusław Rybicki launched his campaign for the 1995 Polish presidential election, running on a protectionism, isolationist and anti-privatization platform. However, he withdrew his candidacy before the election.^[13]

There was also a clear decline in activity. There were only sporadic pickets; the most important manifestation of the party's activity was the lectures delivered in the field by Rybicki. National Party "Fatherland" was still looking for support in Andrzej Lepper and his Samoobrona, but Rybicki party was not an attractive partner for Lepper, especially as Samoobrona steadily moved towards a direction of becoming a 'stabilized' left-wing party. Samoobrona eschwed its vague position in favour of developing a clearly defined far-left ideology - Lepper called for a "worker-peasant alliance" and increasingly marginalized and dismissed the nationalist wing of the party.^[14] By the late 1990s, Lepper also called for return to socialism arguing that it had "not yet reached full maturity".^[15]

Isolated, Rybicki decided that the National Party "Fatherland" is no longer able to function on its own and pursued rapprochement with the National Democratic Party (the grouping representing the 'right' wing in the national camp). As agreed in November 1996, "Fatherland" was to enter the SND. This meant de facto capitulation for Rybicki, as he had to accept not only the statute, but also his partner's alien program line; the only success was the agreement that the leaders of Ojczyzna would be co-opted into the authorities of the united party. The congress of SN Ojczyzna on 15 December 1996 decided to self-dissolve.^[3]