Zenon Kliszko

Who is Zenon Kliszko?

Zenon Kliszko, was a politician in the People's Republic of Poland, considered the right-hand man of KC Polish United Workers' Party leader Władysław Gomułka.

Kliszko graduated from Warsaw University and joined the Polish Communist Party in 1931. He was arrested in 1934 for anti-state agitation and released after the courts established that he was mentally challenged. Kliszko took part in the Warsaw Uprising during Nazi German occupation of Poland and escaped capture by swimming across the river. He met Gomułka in Lublin, befriended him, and became the PZPR apparatchik after the Soviet takeover.

On Kliszko´s advice and recommendation, the communist party took down the production of Dziady by Mickiewicz at the Polish Theatre in Warsaw, leading to 1968 Polish political crisis and the student protests across the country as well as the expulsion from Poland of thousands of individuals of Jewish ancestry. Kliszko was also responsible for ordering the regular Army to massacre striking workers in Gdańsk and Gdynia during the Polish 1970 protests. He was fired from his job and removed from the Party by Edward Gierek.