Kresy Conferences

The Polish government, under pressure from all sides, has seemingly set about the affairs of the "Kresów Wschodnich" (Eastern Borderlands) in earnest.

For a preliminary conference Prime Minister Grabski has organized a fairly large commission, which has already begun work, having heard extensive "reports" by the ministers on the general situation in the "Kresy" in the fields of administration, the "state of security" and education and church affairs.

The composition of "Mr. Grabski's commission" is very interesting. The main core of the commission is the "political committee" of the Council of Ministers. The second group of members consists of members of the Sejm and senators, whom Mr. Grabski personally selected and invited, according to his own taste…

And here is the most interesting thing: not a single representative of the Vilnia region, the capital district of these very "Kresy", has been invited to this commission on the Kresy… Not only have the deputies of the minorities not been invited, but not even the "born masters" of the land, the Polish gentlemen. Instead, in place of the already elected deputies of the local population, who under the Constitution are precisely the ones called "radzić i rządzić" (to counsel and to govern), above all in the affairs of the region, Mr. Grabski has personally, so to speak, "chosen anew" and called to the conference "his own deputies" for the commission: Messrs. Meysztowicz, the former "premier of Central Lithuania"; Roman Skirmunt, a big landowner from the Pinsk region, whom the Vilnia "Słowo" praises highly as "one of the few people who have a programme of administration for the northern voivodeships of Poland"…; Mr. Brzostowski, invited on the recommendation of the "Piast" group; Mr. Wakar, some "idejowy wyzwoleniec" (an ideological man of Wyzwolenie), also invited to the commission together with Mr. Świechowski. They will represent the "left" in it, or, as "Słowo" puts it, "that tendency which is disintegrating our state and which will ruin Poland"…

These are all the "doradcy" (advisers) and experts who will deliberate, and perhaps decide, on the "new direction" of policy toward our Land… Once again, as always, our land will be decided about without us. Is this what is "new"?!