Organisation of the Polish Nation – Polish League (, ONP-LP or ONP) was a Polish centre-right political party founded in 2000 that participated in local and parliamentary Polish elections, bringing together activists from Poland and Poles in exile. The party was created with an aim to create a common front for Polish communities abroad, providing them legal and political representation. Ideologically, the party adhered to "national, cultural and Christian values born out of the over a thousand-year history of the Polish State". The ONP-LP considered itself to be based on the "Christian, agrarian, nationalist and anti-liberal" tradition. It had immigrant community clubs and cooperated with Polish diaspora organisations in Switzerland, Norway and Australia. The party participated in the 2005 Polish parliamentary election as well as the 2005 presidential election, albeit it only won a marginal number of votes. It also ran on electoral lists of nationalist parties until 2019. It was deregistered in 2025.
The party promoted Catholic, Christian democratic and corporatist values, considering "land, resources, property, landscape, environmental, cultural values" to be an integral good and following the Catholic social teaching. In its program, the party planned to fight "against the degeneration of the democratic system", promote Polish patriotic tradition, and to guide the Polish economy by the "national and state interest of Poland" through nationalization programs. It opposed abortion, and supported of Catholic media such as Radio Maryja. It praised the interwar Sanacja regime and promoted a new Polish constitution based on the 1935 April Constitution. One of the main priorities of the party were the Polish communities and repatriates from Russia and Kazakhstan, representing their interests. The ONP-LP was inspired by and claimed to be a successor of the liberal democratic Polish émigré organisation , founded in Switzerland by Zygmunt Miłkowski following the failure of the January Uprising.
History In 1990, the was established to assist the transformation of the Third Polish Republic at the economic level. However, due to a lack of capacity, this did not materialise. It was therefore decided to establish a political party. On 25 October 2000, a grouping under the name "Polish League - Polish Nation's Organisation" was registered in the Register of Political Parties. The party was founded and developed by Polish nationalist communities in Switzerland and Chicago, including the newspaper "Our Poland" () and the Eugeniusz Kwiatkowski Maritime and Economic Association (). At the time of its declaration, the party was declared to be a "united front to save Poland" and was to represent "a refusal to expropriate Poles from their property, national heritage and religious heritage".
On 24 February 2001, a founding congress was held with the participation of delegates from Poland, Western Europe and North and South America. The creation of party structures began in the country, as well as abroad (in Norway, Chicago, France, Switzerland, Australia and Canada). In 2001, attempts by the party to co-operate with Stronnictwo Narodowe activists failed, and they subsequently formed . However, some members of the Polish League ran on LPR lists, failing to gain seats. In 2002 the party took part in the local elections, and in 2003 in the 2003 Polish European Union membership referendum it campaigned to vote against Poland's membership in the European Union.
Polish membership in the EU After the 2003 referendum passed and Poland became a member of the European Union, the party continued to oppose the European Union as well as the Polish membership in it. The party argued that the European Union is dominated by Germany, and that Poland is an inferior member that will be exploited by the much wealthier Western countries. The leader of the party, Jan Pyszko, blamed the Democratic Left Alliance for pushing for the membership in the EU and for mismanaging the aftermath of entering the EU, writing: "Instead of the promised growing prosperity - a ‘return to normality’. - what followed was economic collapse, growing corruption at the highest levels of state leadership, further theft of national assets, robbery and all the symptoms of bankruptcy."
Patriotic Front of the Socialist Left Despite being a right-leaning party, the Organisation of the Polish Nation – Polish League has friendly relations with some left-wing Polish parties, being particularly supportive of left-wing nationalist ones. In December 2003, the party became a part of a political alliance Patriotic Front of the Socialist Left (), composed of marginal left-wing parties and some right-leaning ones. The Patriotic Front was heavily critical of the 1990s reforms that transitioned Poland to a capitalist free market economy, arguing that while the Polish governments of the 1990s promised a "free, prosperous and democratic Poland", the reforms instead resulted in massive unemployment, loss of social rights, poverty, the collapse of health service and wealth inequality.
The alliance proposed policies such as taxation of 'excessive wealth', increasing the minimum wage, restoring the social benefits of the communist Poland, and state control of the economy. The Patriotic Front also argued that the Polish entrance into the European Union resulted into loss of economic sovereignty of Poland, which "may even threaten the loss of its own statehood". The parties of the alliance signed a declaration arguing that Poland has become dominated by foreign capital and is now a "quasi-colony". The parties also condemned policies such as privatisation and allowing foreign capital in Poland, and proposed protectionist laws as well as ban on foreign ownership in important industries. However, ultimately the Patriotic Front of the Socialist Left never carried out political activities.
Jankowski affair In August 2004, the party attracted controversy by defending and claiming the innocence of Polish Catholic priest Henryk Jankowski, who was accused of child sexual abuse. Together with the Union of Polish Organisations in Switzerland (, the Organisation of the Polish Nation – Polish League issued a statement in which it strongly protested "against the slander directed against Father Henryk Jankowski" and declared its readiness to "stand in defence of his reputation, honour and truth". Jankowski was never convicted, and the issue remains unresolved; in 2023, the Polish court censored parts of a 2018 documentary showcasing the accusations against Jankowski, stating that the documentary included unverified and unproven information, and that there was no evidence to portray Jankowski's guilt as certain.
2005 elections In the 2005 Polish parliamentary election, The Polish Nation's Organisation - Polish League put forward six candidates for the Senate, but none of them obtained a seat. They were: Mieczysław Biliński. - Krosno District, Janusz Dobrowolski - Siedlce District, Marek Głogoczowski - Bialystok district, Michał Okrześ - Legnica district, Janusz Soroka - Zielona Góra district, Józef Wysocki - Wrocław district. Together they won 61,038 votes. In the elections to the Sejm, 3 ONP-LP representatives ran unsuccessfully: Witold Kruszyński - Wałbrzych district, Patriotic Movement list, received 89 votes, Roman Urbański - District of Gdynia, list Dom Ojczysty, received 45 votes, Mieczysław Sass - District Bydgoszcz, Narodowe Odrodzenie Polski list, received 26 votes.
The ONP-LP candidate in the 2005 Polish presidential election was party chairman Jan Pyszko - he received 10,371 votes, i.e. 0.07%. The press noted that despite being a Polish émigré activist, Pyszko did not speak Polish well. Polish weekly Wprost compared Pyszko to the 1990s Polish populist presidential candidate Stanisław Tymiński, arguing that both Tymiński and Pyszko represented a kind of populist rhetoric that was outclassed by left-wing populists such as Andrzej Lepper. During the election, the ONP-LP was characterized as a nationalist and anti-EU party that promotes the 1935 Polish constitution and the interests of Polish diaspora. Pyszko summarized the views of his party as following: "We say an absolute ‘No! ’ to the European Union. We say absolutely no to abortion on demand. We say absolutely ‘no! ’ to the germanisation of our Polish land and national assets. Let us get the best Polish women and men into local government." His main campaign slogan was "Poland's future your future".
The party ran a low-profile campaign, spending about 6000 PLN on the presidential campaign in total; in contrast, the winning party, right-wing populist Law and Justice, spend 7.3 million PLN. Jan Pyszko became the oldest presidential candidate in Polish history, as he was 75 at the time. The election was marred with irregularities, as despite only winning 0.07% of the popular vote, Pyszko won 13% of the vote in the Silesiak gmina of Rudnik, while the left-wing populist candidate Andrzej Lepper did not gain a single vote there.
In the 2005 Polish parliamentary election, the party entered talks with the Self-Defence of the Polish Nation, a right-wing nationalist split from the far-left agrarian party Self-Defence of the Republic of Poland. The ONP-LP as well as Self-Defence of the Polish Nation planned to organize a joint list for the election. Ultimately the two parties did not participate in the parliamentary election, but Self-Defence of the Polish Nation endorsed Jan Pyszko in the presidential election.
Later activities In 2006, the party put forward a proposal to create state-owned media that would target Polish diaspora. This media was to promote national consciousness amongst Poles abroad and establish a flow of information between the Polish state and Polish immigrant communities. In order to pursue this goal, the party created the All-Polish online newspaper KWORUM () the same year.
In 2007 to the Sejm and in 2009 to the Parliament, the party's candidate was the then chairman of the party's central board, Jan Eugeniusz Malinowski. In the Warsaw district, in the elections in 2007, running on the Law and Justice list, he received 266 votes, and in the elections to the European Parliament in 2009, running on the Libertas list, he received 128 votes.
In 2008, the party attended the party congress of an agrarian party Piast Faction, created in 2006. The congress was also attended by some former activists of the Self-Defence of the Republic of Poland as well as Polish People's Party. During the congress, the ONP-LP informally became a part of the Piast Faction, in an agreement that was based on the German CDU/CSU union. Both parties declared their intention to create a "Christian-popular-nationalist bloc" that would oppose liberal parties such as the Civic Platform. Some political proposals put forward during the congress including developing the mining industry in Silesia, improving the health service in Poland, and allocating additional funding to education. In February 2008, the Organisation of the Polish Nation – Polish League together with the Piast Faction supported farmer protests against exports of meat products from the European Union. The farmers demanded additional quality controls of imported meat, together with restrictions that would ensure that Polish meat is prioritized in the market.
In 2010, the party attended the funeral of Stefan Melak, Polish activist and journalist who died in the Smolensk air disaster. Together with the Organisation of the Polish Nation – Polish League, the funeral mass was also attended by the Confederation of Independent Poland as well as members of veterans’ organisations.