Gill McGrath reports from Bialystok
TODAY in Poland, legally there is a right to abortion, more or less on demand.
But under the present right-wing/liberal government coalition this right has been increasingly limited by cuts in the national health service as well as by the new 'Medical Code of Ethics', hastily and unconstitutionally drawn up in defiance of the law by a minority group of doctors.
The Code forbids a doctor to perform an abortion except where the woman's life is in danger. Although it has been opposed by many members of the profession, it has been used to intimidate doctors into refusing abortions.
The most powerful opposition to abortion rights however comes from the Catholic Church. Claiming that 'life' begins at conception, it calls abortion the 'sin' of murder. This is also the position of the most powerful party in the Polish parliament, the National Christian Unity/ZChN, as well as some other parties.
The result of the of the activities of the anti-abortionists has been to push through to its present voting stage a Bill which would criminalise all abortions unless the woman's life was in danger.
The penalty for performing the abortion, either by the woman herself or a doctor, would be up to two years in prison. Attempted abortions resulting in the death of the foetus and the woman herself would be punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
Ban on coll
Pre-natal tests will be banned, together with forms of contraception said to cause an 'abortion', such as the coil (IUD) and some forms of contraceptive pills. This draconian law will be voted on either at the end of this year or the beginning of 1993.
How has the situation come about. Do the majority of Polish people want abortion outlawed? Not according to all the opinion polls, the latest of which shows 70 per cent against criminalisation. twenty-none per cent are against any form of restriction on abortion.
The fact that the Bill is opposed by the vast majority is precisely why the catholic Church and right wing are fiercely and loudly opposed to a referendum. Both prime minister Hanna Suchocka and president Lech Walesa are opposing abortion and a referendum.
One reason for their opposition to a referendum is the danger that it would split the present fragile government coalition between the Catholic fundamentalists of the National Christian Unity, and liberals within the Democratic Union (which includes many Solidarity intellectuals.
Abortion is not the only area where democracy is under threat. Economic guru Balcerowicz, architect of the privatisation and austerity drive, recently stated that authoritarian rule was the best way to impose his policies.
The right to strike is under threat. Riot police were used earlier this year to disperse farmers from the militant peasant union Self Defence. The big wave of strikes this summer was denounced by the government as 'illegal', and calls were made for wide-reaching anti-strike laws.
Together with the campaign against abortion and other democratic rights, there is also a big campaign to demand that TV and radio respect 'Christian value and' not offend 'religious values'.
The Committee for a Referendum on Abortion rights was set up earlier this year, on the initiative of the newly formed social democratic party, the Union of Labour. The committee, which is backed by much of the left, and by a section of the liberal and peasant parties, aims to gain the half-million signatures necessary to force a referendum.
Campaign co-ordinating committees have sprung up in many regions including Wroclaw, Lodz, Gdansk, Poznan, Bialystok and elsewhere.