POLISH GOVERNMENT HIKES FOOD, FUEL, ENERGY PRICES
Poland's communist government raised
food, fuel and energy prices but said it had taken an economic
risk by reducing the scale of the increases under pressure from
the country's official trade unions.
    A communique broadcast on Saturday evening said food prices
would rise on average by 9.3 pct, petrol, gas and electricity
by 25 pct and coal by 50 pct.
    The immediate increases will be followed by a rise of 10
pct in the cost of meat from April 1. Some postal charges will
go up 100 pct next month and rail and bus fares by 30 pct in
October.
    The government said its annual plan for the economy had
specified a 13 pct increase in food prices this year.
    "Economic reasoning calls for greater price rises than those
which have been announced ... The government has taken an
economic risk in accepting a portion of the trades unions'
demands," the communique said.
    The National Trade Union Alliance (OPZZ), which claims
seven million members, warned earlier this month it would fight
efforts to impose the original range of price rises. It said
the rises would badly affect the lower paid and the old,
despite government pledges to protect their purchasing power.
    Solidarity leader Lech Walesa, whose banned organisation
has been replaced by the OPZZ, condemned the increases in front
of a crowd of 1,500 cheering supporters at St Brygida's Roman
Catholic Church in the Baltic port of Gdansk.
    "For the first time in six years (since Solidarity was
banned), I say enough. For the first time, I am decidedly
against. I am against price rises as being the only sign of
reform," Walesa said.
    "I am for reforms. I favour the reforms which (Soviet leader
Mikhail) Gorbachev is carrying out  ... But I am not in favour
of make-believe reforms," he said.
 REUTER
