Tadeusz Pyka (May 17, 1930 – May 23, 2009) was a former Polish

communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking, a ...

, who served as a Deputy Prime Minister of Poland. In August 1980, he led a government commission which attempted to end a strike in the Polish city of

Gdańsk Gdańsk ( , also ; ; csb, Gduńsk;Stefan Ramułt, ''Słownik języka pomorskiego, czyli kaszubskiego'', Kraków 1893, Gdańsk 2003, ISBN 83-87408-64-6. , Johann Georg Theodor Grässe, ''Orbis latinus oder Verzeichniss der lateinischen Benen ...

, but he was replaced on August 21 without an explanation offered by state radio at the time for the change.

Political career

Pyka was educated in the

engineering Engineering is the use of scientific method, scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad rang ...

metallurgy Metallurgy is a domain of materials science and engineering that studies the physical and chemical behavior of metallic elements, their inter-metallic compounds, and their mixtures, which are known as alloys. Metallurgy encompasses both the sc ...

. Pyka was a deputy to the

Sejm The Sejm (English: , Polish: ), officially known as the Sejm of the Republic of Poland (Polish: ''Sejm Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej''), is the lower house of the bicameral parliament of Poland. The Sejm has been the highest governing body of t ...

, the Polish legislative body, for three consecutive terms from 1972 to 1980. In 1974, he became a deputy to the Chairman of the Planning Commission of the

Central Committee of the Polish United Workers Party Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party ( pl, Komitet Centralny Polskiej Zjednoczonej Partii Robotniczej, KC PZPR) was the central ruling body of the Polish United Workers' Party, the dominant political party in the People's Republic ...

. He was also a Deputy Prime Minister of Poland from October 23, 1975 to August 24, 1980, and a member of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers Party until 1980. In 1980, he was also briefly a deputy to a member of the

Politburo of the Polish United Workers' Party The Politburo (abbreviation for ''Political Bureau'') of the Polish United Workers Party (PUWP; pl, Polska Zjednoczona Partia Robotnicza, ''PZPR'') was the chief executive body of the ruling communist apparatus in Poland between 1948 and 1989. Ne ...

. During the period of martial law in Poland in 1981 he was interned for a year and had charges pressed against him.

Gdańsk negotiations

In August 1980, due to economic difficulties, workers in the Polish city of

went on strike. Around the middle of that month, the Polish government declared that it had created a commission that would converse with the strikers. The commission was led by Pyka, who was a relative newcomer to the inner circle of the communist Polish United Workers' Party, and a "junior man" when compared to Poland's other Deputy Prime Ministers. He was described as a "minor Party functionary" and a "close ally of Edward Gierek", the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party. Pyka stated that he would have "nothing to do" with the Inter-Enterprise Strike Committee, the main representative body of the Gdańsk strikers, especially with members Lech Wałęsa and Andrzej Gwiazda, as well as

Anna Walentynowicz Anna Walentynowicz (; ; 15 August 1929 – 10 April 2010) was a Polish free trade union activist and co-founder of Solidarity, the first non-communist trade union in the Eastern Bloc. Her firing from her job at the Lenin Shipyard in Gdańsk in Aug ...

. Pyka argued that the Strike Committee was illegal, and that it did not represent the workers it claimed to. He was replaced as leader of the commission with

Mieczysław Jagielski Mieczysław Zygmunt Jagielski (12 January 192427 February 1997) was a Polish politician and economist. During the times of the People's Republic of Poland he was the last leading politician from the former eastern regions of pre-Second World War ...

on August 21. State Polish Radio at the time gave no explanation as to why Pyka was replaced.

Post-political career

He was a

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who pr ...

economics Economics () is the social science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and intera ...

at the Górnośląska Wyższa Szkoła Handlowa in

Katowice Katowice ( , , ; szl, Katowicy; german: Kattowitz, yi, קאַטעוויץ, Kattevitz) is the capital city of the Silesian Voivodeship in southern Poland and the central city of the Upper Silesian metropolitan area. It is the 11th most popul ...

. He died on May 23, 2009.The date of death was announced at the main page of the http://www.gwsh.pl/ Katowice School of Economics] (retrieved on 25 May 2009)
The obituary
published there gave the date of the funeral for 27 May (it however did no contain the death of the date).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pyka, Tadeusz 1930 births 2009 deaths Polish economists Polish United Workers' Party members Deputy Prime Ministers of Poland

Political career

Gdańsk negotiations

Post-political career

See also

References