At the Lech Walesa Award ceremony last month Mikhail Khodorkovsky was described as the ‘Rockerfeller who became Mandela’  by a former Polish Prime Minister.

Mikhail Khodorkovsky received the prestigious Lech Walesa prize at the ceremony in September where guests were addressed with a powerful speech dedicated to the winner.

The ‘Rockefeller who became Mandela’ speech was authored and read by Jan Krzysztof Bielecki, a Polish liberal politician and economist, and Prime Minister of Poland for most of 1991. The speech was published in full in the Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza.

Excerpts from the speech are available below in English:

“The story of Mikhail Khodorkovsky is a universal tale about a man, who changed for the better. About a man, who chose to stay true to his values at the price of losing his wealth and his freedom. A man who used to have all the luxuries, and has now found the meaning of life in a prison cell. Meaning enclosed in values like truth, freedom, rights of an individual and democracy. This man stubbornly believes that his motherland, Russia, might break a centuries’ long tradition of authoritarian rule. Break the course of history and join the family of democratic countries, based on freedom, respect for law and civil liberties.

In 2002 he set up the Open Russia foundation which was conducting a wide range of social and economic programmes. It promoted the development of the Internet, supported talented youth, conducted civic education, developed volunteer work. As part of this project a high school was created near Moscow where children from poor or pathological families, orphans, children of soldiers stationed in trouble spots, could learn. Children, who survived the trauma of terrorist attacks. Today the facility gathers 180 children from 40 regions. Another initiative is an imaginative grant for the Library of Congress.

Khodorkovsky consistently maintained that his trial and the accusations he faced were fictitious. He stressed that in the West, where his case was the cause of heated debate on the rule of law in Russia, many people believed that he was convicted for different crimes to those listed in the indictment. During the trial he refused to plead guilty despite suggestions that it could help him be freed or to emigrate. We know those methods well from the history of Polish opposition.

The essence of our decision to give the Lech Walesa Award to Mikhail Khodorkovsky is the belief that his attitude and behaviour during the trial and in jail make him a symbol of the fight for superior values. We are convinced that the fate of our laureate is a symbol of change from a man of financial success to someone who achieves moral victory.

Jail is a test of character and physical endurance for everyone. Some political prisoners are under more pressure than criminals. Often they are tempted to buy their freedom at the price of self-accusation or collaboration.

Khodorkovsky was also tested this way, but he never bent.”