President of Poland, Nobel Prize winner, Walesa worked as a mechanic before serving in the Polish army for two years. In 1976, after leading a clash between shipyard workers and the government, he was forced to take odd jobs to support his wife and children.

Undaunted, in 1978, Walesa began to organize non-communist trade unions and was put under surveillance by government security. Two years later, he led the Gdansk shipyard strike, fighting for workers’ rights. Forced to negotiate with Walesa’s union, the authorities signed the Gdansk Agreement in 1980, giving workers the right to strike and organize independent unions.

Walesa’s role in the Gdansk Agreement earned him an international audience, and he travelled to Italy, Japan, Sweden, France and Switzerland as guest of the International Labour Organisation. In September 1981, he was elected Solidarity Chairman at the First National Solidarity Congress in Gdansk.

After General Jaruzelski imposed martial law in 1981, Walesa was interned in a remote country house. He was released in 1982, but kept under surveillance, even as he won the Nobel Prize in July 1983. As Jaruzelski’s regime became increasingly weak and unpopular, it was forced to negotiate with Walesa and the Solidarity Movement, resulting in parliamentary elections to establish a non-communist government.

In December 1990, Walesa was elected President of the Republic of Poland in a general election, becoming Poland’s first post-communist leader. He served until defeated in November 1995. Since then, Walesa’s aggressive style alienated voters, and he often embarrassed the political establishment with his bluntness and lack of sophistication. In the 2000 presidential election, Walesa received less than 1 percent of the vote, after which he announced his political retirement.