■ Polish Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński

By a Special Correspondent in Warsaw

WARSAW, October 14, 2006  –  Speculation on the sexuality of the Polish Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński has been rife in Poland for years.  And this week, former President Lech Walesa confirmed what he said on television more than 10 years ago.

President Walesa was interviewed live on TVP, the state television channel, in 1993 and was talking about his birthday party.  Asked who came, he famously said that that he invited Lech Kaczyński (now President) and his wife and  Jarosław Kaczyński and his husband. But neither attended.

On Thursday, appearing on the Polish commercial television station TVN's Teraz My programme, former President Walesa confirmed to anchors Tomasz Sekielski and Andrzej Morozowski what he had suggested 13 years ago.

This followed the revelations in Wyborcza and Rzeczpospolita – two Polish newspapers, that the Polish Secret Service had in 1992 undertaken an investigation to find out the identity of Jarosław Kaczyński’s boyfriend, and if the relationship was stable.

The Secret Service in the communist regime also investigated Jarosław Kaczyński and papers publish in the Polish press say that he was not interested in meeting women.

After Lech Walesa made his original comments on television, Jarosław Kaczyński said he wanted to sue.  But he could not as the head of state is immune from such action.

Now, without such immunity, Lech Walesa repeated the allegations – again on television.  So far there has been no reaction from Jarosław Kaczyński.

While his identical twin brother President Lech Kaczyński is regarded as more homophobic, Jarosław Kaczyński leads a homophobic government which is currently considering a new tax law that will discriminate against a gay couple – if passed, it will be first openly anti-gay law in Poland.

Earlier this year, the well-known Polish journalist Mikolaj Kunica recorded an interview with Wojciech Jasinki, a government minister and long-time friend of Jaroslaw, for TVP-1’s Wiadomosc news programme.

Kunica was widely reported in the Polish press to have asked about their social life when they were younger.  Jasinki said they liked to have a party – to dance and drink.  Kunica then  asked if they dated girls to which Jasinki replied that he did, but “Jaroslaw – never”.

This segment of the interview was never transmitted.  Marzena Paczuska, editor of Wiadomosc, ordered the segment on girls to be cut, but Kunica refused and was supported by Robert Kozak, the head of news at TVP-1, who overruled the decision.

The matter then went to Maciej Grzywaczewski, the head of TVP-1 who supported Paczuska’s original decision.  He then suspended Kunica and subsequently fired him, saying the material was “aggressive, full of emotion and anti-governmental”.

There has been a problem with Jarosław Kaczyński’s files kept by ex-communist secret service. They were declassified after a considerable delay which, according to general belief, could be caused by the need to remove any allusions to sexual life.

Also politicians seem to take this fact for granted and have alluded to this on numerous occasions.

Andrzej Lepper from Samoobrona commented: “I wanted to see Mr. Kaczyński, but he had no time for me. Who am I, some girl which would like to date him ...if he dates any.” This caused an outburst of laughter among the journalists.

Even the members from Jarosław Kaczyński’s own party, PiS, suspect he is not straight. When the press wrote about his alleged affair with Mrs. Joanna Szypińska, an MP from PiS, party colleagues reacted with amused disbelief.

“This must be some joke,” commented Andrze Szypiński.

And senior PiS party official Tadeusz Cymański added: “A wedding? This would be a surprise.”