(from Wikipedia) Lech Walesa (born 29 September 1943) is a Polish politician, trade-union organizer, and human-rights activist. A charismatic leader, he co-founded Solidarity (Solidarnosc), the Soviet bloc's first independent trade union, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1983, and served as President of Poland 1990–95.

Walesa was an electrician by trade, with no higher education. Soon after beginning work at the Gdansk (then, "Lenin") Shipyards, he became a trade-union activist. For this he was persecuted by the Polish communist government, placed under surveillance, fired in 1976, and arrested several times. In August 1980 he was instrumental in negotiations that led to the ground-breaking Gdansk Agreement between striking workers and the government, and he became a co-founder of the Solidarity trade-union movement. Arrested again after martial law was imposed and Solidarity was outlawed, upon release he continued his activism and was prominent in the establishment of the 1989 Round Table Agreement that led to semi-free parliamentary elections in June 1989 and to a Solidarity-led government.

Links:

• Man in the News; The Grandmaster of Polish Politics: NY Times, Dec 11, 1990
• God must have parachuted him to Earth  December 2008
• New Statesman interview with Lech Walesa 
• Wałęsa speech (mp3)
• Lech Walesa – Nobel Lecture