“I would like you to have the feeling that not only you remember one another, that not only the Polish church remembers you and sends priests here, but also that the Republic of Poland remembers your,” president Andrzej Duda said on Thursday to the Poles living in Kazakhstan.
The president with his spouse Agata Kornhauser-Duda had a meeting with Poles in Astana on Thursday.
Duda emphasised that the Polish authorities were trying to create conditions for repatriation. The president dedicated a large part of his speech to the upholding of national identity among the Poles living in Kazakhstan. He thanked them for cultivating their Polish identity and culture. He extended thanks to, among others, parents who send their children to attend Polish lessons and to the priests who provide support to the Poles in Kazakhstan.
“Thousands of people simply died”
The president decorated with medals three persons active for the benefit of the Polish community in Kazakhstan. Priest Stanisław Marian Hoinka was honoured with Officer’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland. Vladimir Abermit and Oleg Czerwiński were awarded the Knight’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland.
“You are the successors of those who once were brought here, as that was the most frequent manner to get here,” the president addressed the audience. He said that there was a small group of Poles who once came to the Kazakh territory on their own accord, in search of opportunities for a new life.
“Then Kazakhstan, those steppes, became no more than a symbol of Polish ordeal and of people who were forced, typically loaded into train carriages like animals, squeezed in a crowd with some minor possessions there were allowed to take with them. Sometimes families were separated. People were brought here, not once they were simply thrown out from the carriages onto the snow-covered steppe, into the emptiness, without even a smallest shed, and they were left,” stressed Duda.
“Thousands of people simply died. Those who survived were the strongest, had more luck, were healthier and more resilient and you are their descendants,” said the president.
“You live in this country and in a sense you consider it as your homeland,” said Duda. He pointed out that the reason why Poles remained in Kazakhstan was probably that – as he himself frequently heard from them – the people whose origins were in this land and who “did not contribute to the terrible fate of the Poles” turned to be kind and helped.
“One wanted to live among such people and that is why you stayed here. Because you had the feeling that although you were in a foreign country, you lived on a land that was kind to you because that was the land of kind people,” he stressed.
“I would like you to have the feeling that not only you remember one another, that not only the Polish church remembers you and sends priests here, but also that the Republic of Poland remembers your,” Duda said.
President on repatriations
The president added that the Polish authorities were trying to create conditions for repatriation. “I hope that if you want to come to Poland, you will be able to do so, that such possibilities will be created and Poland will be able, to a degree much greater than until present, to accept Poles living abroad, especially those who did not found themselves there because they wanted to,” emphasised Duda.
The president informed that Polish children in Kazakhstan had received school supplies, which were handed over at a meeting with Polish pupils on Wednesday by the president’s spouse. 60 sets of school supplies were prepared by PGNiG.
According to Duda, 1500 people learn Polish in 33 locations in Kazakhstan.
Stanisław Kamiński, a teacher of Polish seconded to Kazakhstan by the Centre for the Development of Polish Education Abroad told journalists that fluency in Polish among the Poles in Kazakhstan is low; Polish is typically used by people who have been to Poland or in whose homes Polish has been spoken for a long time.
Kamiński said that he taught Polish in three locations, in each there are groups of up to 30 people. According to the teacher, half of his pupils have already gone to Poland. However, Kamiński stressed that coming back was not easy; many people do not decide to go fearing their insufficient knowledge of Polish.
Oleg Czerwiński, who took the floor on behalf of those decorated by the president on Thursday, emphasised that an order awarded by president Andrzej Duda was the greatest honour for him and would always remain something to be proud of. “I treat this as a distinction not only for myself, but above all as a sign of remembrance of the tragic fate out our ancestors forced to move out from their homeland,” said Czerwiński.
He mentioned that his family had to leave their homeland overnight just because they were Polish. He explained that when Stalin’s people deported Czerwiński’s family to the far-away Kazakh steppe, they expected that the distance would make the deported forget their homeland . “That did not happen! I am standing here in front of you representing three generations of the deported and I would like to say loudly: the effort has been unsuccessful!” he said and his words were received with a loud applause by the participants of the meeting with the president.
Thirty-four thousand Poles
At present in Kazakhstan 34,000 people declare their Polish nationality and just as much declare their Polish origin.
The amendment of the act on repatriation, prepared by the government, was signed by president Andrzej Duda in April this year. It introduces new forms of financial aid to repatriates and facilitates the return and possibility of settling down in Poland for people of Polish origin.
This concerns Poles exiled or deported the USSR authorities to: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kirgizstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan or Asian part of the Russian Federation as well as descendants of those persons.
The new regulations have been in force since 1 May 2017; some of the regulations should come into force on 1 September this year.
The presidential and his spouse are on their visit to Kazakhstan until Friday. President Duda talked to, among others, president of Kazakhstan Nazarbajev and took part in the National Polish Day at the Expo in Astana.
Źródło: tvn24.pl/tłumaczenie Intertext.com.pl