Editor's note: Banks under attack

Those who voted in favor of the commission claim that banking services in Poland are outrageously expensive, the banking sector has been sold out to foreign capital and as a result of the central bank's and Leszek Balcerowicz's activities, interest rates in Poland are far too high.

These are all very seductive accusations, especially when you shriek them from the Sejm podium on behalf of the downtrodden. Unfortunately, all of this clamor only amounts to yet another diversionary tactic to push the country's real economic problems out of the discussion.

I won't go on forever about the fact that even at first glance the charges made by these politicians are at the very least questionable. It's enough to look at the numbers - foreign capital controls 68 percent of the Polish banking sector, while in Hungary the figure reaches 82 percent, in Slovakia 87 percent and in the Czech Republic it is as much as 96 percent. Many of the fees charged by the state-controlled Polish bank PKO BP are higher than those of its foreign competitors.

But it's worth stressing one thing that the Council of Entrepreneurs of Poland pointed to in their open letter recently: Attacking the Polish banking sector means criticizing the Polish free-market system and all of the reforms implemented after 1989 - the reforms that made Poland famous worldwide and made it an example for other countries in the former communist block.

It was the independence of the central bank and effective functioning of institutions responsible for controling the financial market that transformed Poland into one of the darlings of foreign investors.

The reliable financial system is a real achievement of our 17 years of reforms. I hope that political games will not be able to destroy Poland's positive international image, and that Deputies' caterwauling won't penetrate beyond their local playground in the Sejm.

Eliza Durka
Editor-in-chief