Legend of the "Fighting Solidarity"

Kornel Morawiecki was born in 1941 in Warsaw. In later years, however, he moved to Wrocław. During the communist era he was a physicist and university teacher. This man distinguished himself by his fight against the communist system in Poland. He was active in the democratic opposition, being the founder and chairman of the "Fighting Solidarity" organisation.

In 1968, he took part in student strikes protesting against the entry of Warsaw Pact troops into Czechoslovakia and the suppression of workers' protests by the Communist authorities in December 1970.

From the late 1970s, he co-edited the underground "Biuletyn Dolnośląski". In 1981, Kornel Morawiecki was a delegate at the first congress of the Solidarity Trade Union in Gdańsk. After the delegalisation of "Solidarity" by the communist authorities in 1982, he founded "Fighting Solidarity". In its manifesto, the organisation advocated the uncompromising recovery of the independence of Poland. 

In 1988 he was awarded the Officer's Cross of the Order of Polonia Restituta by the President of the Republic of Poland in Exile, Kazimierz Sabbat.

As Senior Speaker in 2015, he opened the 8th term of the Polish Sejm. In recognition of his outstanding achievements in public and state activity, in 2019, he was awarded the Order of the White Eagle by President Andrzej Duda.

Regional assembly hall named after Kornel Morawiecki

The idea of honouring the late Kornel Morawiecki by naming a hall after him originated with the Lower Silesian Governor Jarosław Obremski and the Lower Silesian Regional Assembly. The hall, located in the Lower Silesian Voivodship Office, never had a patron before.

The Wrocław branch of the Institute of National Remembrance prepared and produced a plaque commemorating the late Kornel Morawiecki. It was unveiled on 30 September in one of the two most representative halls in the Lower Silesian Voivodeship Office. 

In 2014, The Lower Silesian Regional Assembly honoured Kornel Morawiecki with the title of Honorary Citizen of Lower Silesia. 

"Solidarność to takie moje życie wieczne" – a movie about Kornel Morawiecki

Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki attended the screening of the movie "Solidarność to takie moje życie wieczne" (Solidarity is a kind of eternal life for me). The documentary's title refers to the words of Kornel Morawiecki, who reminisces in the movie about his former colleagues from the opposition. The documentary shows how the events of 1968 influenced his later political activities. The author of the production is Alicja Grzymalska - a documentalist of the history of the "Fighting Solidarity", the Orange Alternative and the Freedom and Peace Movement. In order to create the movie, the filmmaker talked to Kornel Morawiecki's widow, Jadwiga, and the activists of "Fighting Solidarity".

Exhibition "Wrocław 1945-2016" at the Zajezdnia History Centre

After the film's screening, the head of Government Mateusz Morawiecki visited the Zajezdnia History Centre in Wrocław. The place was opened in 2016 as a museum and is run by the Centre "Remembrance and Future". The facility deals with the history of Lower Silesia, in particular the history of Wrocław after 1945, the Wrocław "Solidarity" movement and the Regained Territories. The old building of the current museum is a memorial to the events of the August 1980 Solidarity movement, when the first Inter-Enterprise Strike Committee in the region was established. 

The leading scenographic exhibition "Wrocław 1945-2016" is the heart of the Zajezdnia History Centre. It shows the course of the arrival of the Polish population into Wrocław after World War II. It also presents the formation of the city and the recovery of its identity in 1980.