Statement on the EU attempts to crush the Greek working class

The European Union has exposed its essential class nature in its attitude to the Greek people. After months of arm-twisting, bullying and blackmail it has imposed even more draconian austerity on the working people of Greece.

The stance taken by the Irish government was only to be expected, as it long ago surrendered all pretence of defending Irish national and political sovereignty and the interests of our people. They have accepted their role as gatekeepers and willing collaborators in defending the interests of the EU above those of the people. They never fought for the interests of the Irish people, so why would one expect them to champion the interests of the Greek people regarding debt and austerity?
Developments within the European Union confirm the stand taken by the Communist Party of Ireland over many decades regarding the various treaties, the EU’s essential class nature and whose interests it serves.

The humiliation of the Greek people is designed to send a very clear message to workers throughout Europe: that criticism or alternative economic and social policies will be defeated. This is for the purpose of reinforcing the mantra of “TINA”: that there is no alternative to the dominant interests of the monopolies and big business. It is clear that no matter who working people vote for, or how many referendums they have, there is only one economic, political and social policy allowed within the European Union.

The CPI has consistently challenged the illusions deliberately nurtured and fostered by both the EU and its supporters among the Irish economic and political establishment, also including elements within the trade union leadership, all the main political parties, and, unfortunately, sections of the political left.

The reformist illusions of SYRIZA have come unstuck on the nature of the European Union and the real, existing class interests at the heart of the EU. Equally—as we have consistently pointed out—debt was and is being used as the main weapon against the people, creating the pretext for a massive assault on workers’ rights and conditions, not only here in Ireland but throughout Europe, to justify a massive transfer of public wealth to both domestic and global monopolies, resulting from the privatisation of public companies and assets.

The dominant elements within SYRIZA have accepted plans for a high level of domestic economic supervision by the bail-out monitors of the Troika, including the IMF, as well as an “overhaul” of public administration supervised by the EU Commission.

It is clear even at this early stage that the SYRIZA government has surrendered many of its “red-line” demands and agreed to accept draconian measures in a renewed assault on workers, including attacks on pensions and an increase in VAT by Wednesday 15 July, as a precondition for starting negotiations over a third bail-out package—yet to be defined or agreed—that may total between €82 and €86 billion over three years. And another “red line” has been crossed: contrary to Greek demands, the IMF will be involved in the third bail-out.

In addition, Greece will have to transfer more than €50 billion in public assets to a “trust fund” before they are privatised, including the national electricity service, ports and harbours, and many other vital public assets.

SYRIZA has also agreed to even more ambitious market “reforms,” abandoning its pledge to reverse previous attacks on workers’ rights or what the establishment calls “labour market reforms,” notably on collective bargaining. This is the culmination of the disarming of the working class.

Half the proceeds of the sale of public companies (€25 billion) will be used for recapitalising banks, and a quarter each (€12½ billion) will go to debt repayments and investment; in other words, the people’s wealth is to be squandered in the interests of the rich and powerful.

Reformist parties such as SYRIZA, the SPD in Germany, the British Labour Party, the French, Spanish and Portuguese “Socialist Parties,” the Irish Labour Party and other such political formations throughout Europe have facilitated this continuing assault on workers, siding with their own ruling class, in alliance with the EU, against workers. These reformist parties are the conduit for securing the interests of those same dominant economic and political forces within the workers’ movement. These political groupings have increasingly become essential mechanisms of control over workers and their organisations.

We express our solidarity with the Greek working class and with the Communist Party of Greece, who we are sure will mobilise the class-conscious workers of Greece to resist these new chains of slavery and exploitation. It is the duty of Irish workers—and all workers—to show solidarity and find common cause in the struggle against these renewed attacks on Greek workers, which will soon come to all the workers of Europe.

Many on the left, both in Ireland and elsewhere in Europe, continue to sow the illusion that there is somehow a “pain-free” way out of the crisis, that the straitjacket of the euro and continued membership of the EU itself provide the best or even the only way to prevent the further suffering of the people. In reality the EU is doing precisely what it was designed to do: to protect the interests of European big business and monopolies.

There is clearly a need for an open and honest dialogue among those forces that claim to hold the interests of workers as central to their political ideas and goals. Central to that dialogue is genuine debate about the nature of the European Union.

National democracy and sovereignty are not optional extras but are vital necessities in creating the conditions for radical transformative economic, political and social strategy, a strategy that puts the people first. A strategy that strengthens the power of labour and weakens the power of capital.

Upcoming CPI event

KKE Statement on referendum results

On the 5th of July 2015, a referendum was held in Greece. The question posed was whether the citizens agreed or not with the proposed agreement, tabled by the EU-IMF-ECB, that will continue the anti-people measures worth 8 billion euros.

The governmental majority of SYRIZA-ANEL rejected the proposal of the KKE for the government’s draft agreement to also be placed before the judgment of the Greek people in the referendum together with the issue of abolishing all the anti-people laws that have been passed in recent years and the issue of disengaging from the EU. At the same time, the coalition government explained that the NO in the referendum is interpreted by the government as approval for its own proposed agreement with the EU-IMF-ECB, which inside 47+8 pages also includes harsh antiworker-antipeople measures, worth about 8 billion euros.

In these conditions, the KKE called on the workers to turn their backs on the false dilemma which was being posed in the referendum, using all appropriate means. The forces of the KKE outside the election centres handed out its own ballot paper to the voters which said:

NO TO THE PROPOSAL OF THE EU-IMF-ECB

NO TO THE PROPOSAL OF THE GOVERNMENT

DISENGAGEMENT FROM THE EU, WITH THE PEOPLE IN POWER

Of course, it was understood that this ballot paper would be counted as a spoiled ballot, but together with the blank ballot papers and the abstention it constitutes a political current that disputes the choices of the SYRIZA-ANEL government and also of the imperialist organizations, with whom the government is negotiating for the needs of capital in Greece.

It should be noted that together with the parties of the coalition government (SYRIZA-ANEL) fascist Golden Dawn also took a position in favour of the NO,, as well as other small nationalist and ultra-left groups, like ANTARSYA.

On the other side, the rightwing opposition ND, social-democratic PASOK that governed until January 2015, together with POTAMI, KIDHSO (the party of the former Prime Minister G. Papandreou) and other smaller bourgeois political forces  took a position in favour of a YES which they stated would be interpreted as being consent to “staying in the EU at all costs”.

In his first statements after the announcement of the result, D. Koutsoumpas, the GS of the CC of the KKE saluted the thousands of people who responded to the call of the KKE and did not submit to the blackmailing dilemmas i.e. those that cast the ballot proposed by the KKE into the ballot box, a proposal which the government refused to put to the vote in the Parliament, depriving the people of the right to cast it in a mass way into the ballot box.

He noted that in relation to the dubious question of the snap referendum, a section of the people was able to overcome the entrapment and deception and gave a first response, with the spoiled ballot, and also with the blank ballot, while some chose abstention from this process.

The GS addressed himself in particular to those who chose NO, believing that in this way they could stop austerity, that they can answer the anti-people measures and memoranda in this way. He called on them not to be complacent and not to consent to the government’s effort to transform this NO into a YES to new anti-people agreements. He stressed that the KKE extends its hand to them for the struggles against the deterioration of their lives that will begin the day after the referendum.

The KKE issued a similar militant call to those who chose YES under pressure from the big employers, due to fear about closed banks and fear of the consequences for their salaries, pensions and small savings.

The KKE notes that the negotiations promised by Mr Tsipras, based on his proposal, will inevitably lead to a new worse memorandum.

The situation highlights the necessity of the movement and our people adopting the proposal of the KKE for a pro-people way out of the crisis in a mass and determined way. The KKE will be in the frontline of all the struggles of our people in the following period, strengthening, from tomorrow, the anti-monopoly anti-capitalist line of struggle, the rallying around the KKE.

Communities Say No to Water Wage Theft

Water is a human right: Not a commodity

On the final night of the Dail before our politicians take their summer 
holidays at our expense, Communities Against Water Charges are calling a 
mass demonstration on Kildare Street, Dublin 2. The Government are 
trying to ram through legislation which will frighten and scare people 
into paying their water charges…but it won’t work. We know that they 
can’t take action until after the next general election, and by that 
time, we’ll have already beaten water charges and will be making sure 
this is the last summer holiday these TD’s get at our expense.

Come along at 6pm on Wednesday, 15th July and say goodbye to our crony TD’s.

The power of the people is greater than the people in power…and we’ll 
prove it on July 15th.

https://www.facebook.com/events/128856367447454/

Organised by: Communities Against Water Charges

Cork solidarity with Greece rally, words from the Connolly Youth Movement.

The political character of the Troika in Greece, phantom like, has donned the same uniform of the colonial empires of old, casting to the wind all doubts and apprehensions about its true nature. The much-vaunted myth and propaganda of the European Union as a fraternal brotherhood of nations has been well and truly laid to rest, and even its most delusional adherents now find themselves bereft of recourse. The bellicose, exploitative actions we have been witnessing since the beginning of the recession, the bullying and manipulation, have shed light on a framework of control that a prescient few have recognised since its inception.

The posture and methods of the Greek Ruling class mirror the gombeen men and robber barons of colonial Ireland, where the capitalists and the land owners were propped up precariously by a foreign power in order to ensure that the bottom line continued to be extracted from the country, a national bourgeoisie which only sought to champion the interests of the whole nation when its own financial and political security was at risk, and even then tentatively.

The same principles of colonialism have existed, in different forms, for centuries, and what we are observing in Greece is merely its latest incarnation. Caught between a rock and a hard place, the ruling class of Greece has been attempting to placate the international hierarchy of capital one hand, while preventing the rise of radical politics and revolutionary activity at home on the other. Their policy of austerity and servility has exposed them to the latter and alienated the working class.

Syriza has capitalised on the aspirations of the working class and society’s desperation for a solution, and has risen to power on a mandate of representing Greece’s interests in opposition of the Troika’s. Despite this, the offensive of the IMF, European Central Bank and European Union has been relentless, and Syriza has been forced into a position where they have no options remaining to them other than to capitulate or take on a revolutionary character.

The Greek Communist party, which has voluntarily remained independent of the ruling government in Greece, has been a strong exponent of a repudiation of the debt in Greece as the only solution which can provide a future for its people, and the Communist Party of Ireland strongly advocates this policy in tandem.

The debt both countries face has been foisted upon us as a result of the irresponsible borrowing practices and underhanded dealings of the most privileged of society. People who, from the cradle, have neither known want nor fear of poverty. The socialisation of debt carried out by their cronies in successive governments has given the the opportunity to avoid losing their lavish lifestyle despite personal culpability, and has enabled their puppetmasters in Europe to retain a return on investment and enhance their own already considerable personal wealth.

In this untouchable sphere of profound opulence, the level of wealth is growing and growing. In repulsive contrast, working class people are being pushed into deprivation and poverty. Away from this surreal world of unaccountability and excess, cuts are having tangible and debilitating effects on the lives of ordinary people. Suicide rates are rising and more young people are opting out of higher education and living at home. We all only have one life, and the options and privileges available to working people are shrinking yearly, all in order to fill the pockets of bankholders and speculators. It is an illegitimate, odious debt. The only honourable course of action open to the Greek people is to reject it.  

As peripheral nations, Ireland and Greece are going through experiences which mirror each other, and we have a unique knowledge of the struggle the Greek people are facing from our own experience as a colony and an exploited people, both outside and within the European Union. The decision made today will reflect the discontent felt by the Greek people, and I believe it will show an exuberant spirit worthy of admiration and respect. And we certainly owe the Greek people our admiration when they are taking a step which the Irish people have failed to take in facing down one of the most powerful institutions in the world. 

If we allow the impoverishment of ourselves and our loved ones for the enrichment of sociopathic aristocrats hundreds of miles away, if we allow our lives to fade away in ignominy and in stolen hours, it is a capitulation that will follow us for the rest of our lives, it is a surrender that will haunt us when we exhale our dying breaths – not just that we failed future generations, not just that we failed an abstract ideological principle – but that we failed ourselves.  If not us, then who?

Fergal Twomey, National Chairperson of the Connolly Youth Movement.

We do not choose the anti-people measures of the EU, IMF and government

The KKE held on the 2^nd of July its central rally before the referendum on the 5^th of July.

Dimitris Koutsoumpas, the GS of the CC of the KKE, spoke at the mass rally and stressed amongst other things:

“Our people are being called on to take part in a referendum with a YES or a NO, which are only different in terms of appearance.

Both the YES and the NO mean the acceptance of a new memorandum of anti-people measures, perhaps the worst that we have seen up to now.

Both the YES and NO will lead the people to new torments and tragedies.

Both the YES and the NO mean anti-worker, anti-people measures.

The referendum is an alibi for a new memorandum-agreement at the expense of the Greek people.

The KKE calls on the Greek people to reject all the blackmail, to cast its proposal into the ballot box and say:

WE DO NOT CHOOSE ANTI-PEOPLE MEASURES-WE DO NOT CHOOSE A NEW MEMORANDUM-WE CANCEL OUT THE FALSE DILEMMAS.

WE SAY NO TO THE PROPOSAL OF THE EU-IMF-ECB AND TO ANY COMPROMISE PROPOSAL OF THE GOVERNMENT, BECAUSE THEY WILL ALL BANKRUPT THE PEOPLE.

WE DEMAND DISENGAGEMENT FROM THE PREDATORY ALLIANCE OF THE EU WITH THE PEOPLE TRULY HOLDING THE REINS OF POWER.

The people must cast a ballot paper into the ballot box which can not be misinterpreted. The following ballot must be cast which says  : “NO to the proposal of the EU-ECB-IMF. NO to the proposal of the government. Disengagement from the EU, with the people holding the reins of power.” Even if they say that it is a spoiled ballot.”

PCP Statement

Communiqué by the Central Committee of the Portuguese Communist Party

The Central Committee of the PCP, meeting on 28 June 2015, addressed aspects of the political, economic and social situation; stressed the importance of the National March “the Force of the People”; discussed and laid down the main lines of work regarding the legislative elections, for the struggle of the workers and people and the reinforcement of the Party.

I—Defeat the right-wing policy, build the patriotic and left-wing alternative

The Central Committee of the PCP points out that the economic and social situation of the country continues to worsen and that the PSD/CDS-PP government propaganda and that of the President of the Republic, acting in an unacceptable manner as its spokesman, that “the worst is over,” affronts the reality of the life of the workers and of the vast majority of the people and conflicts with the real situation of the country.

     Sensing that the defeat is near, in recent months the government has tried to create a policy of faits accomplis, standing out the worsening of the exploitation and impoverishment of the workers and people, the privatisations, the shaping of the State to the interests of big business, and the deterioration of the democratic regime. With the release of the election programs of PSD/CDS and PS it becomes clear that both are committed to the essential instruments and axes of right-wing policies, placing before the people and the country the prospect of continuing stagnation, impoverishment, dependence, and national decline.

     The intervention of the PCP is crucial to continuing the combat, denunciation and organisation of the struggle to counter the measures that the right-wing policy aims to achieve before the elections; to affirm an alternative, patriotic and left-wing policy; to boost the confidence necessary to enable the construction of the electoral strengthening of CDU.

     In this context, it is even more necessary to strengthen the PCP, at the political, organic, ideological, electoral and financial levels, a decisive factor for the rupture with the right-wing policy and to make way for a patriotic and left-wing policy.

II—Combat the serious economic, social and political situation; No to national decline

     1. In a context marked by the nearing of the elections, with the government trying to mystify and conceal the most aggressive aspects of its policy, or mitigate their impact, there is no real process of recovery and economic revival—which continues in a vicious circle of recession-stagnation despite a favourable external environment—nor even of the reversal of the most brutal social regression that has hit the country since the fascist regime.

     The real evolution of the economic situation is clear: the anaemic growth of GDP, which remains at the level of 2001; a public debt that the cosmetics of advance payments, incurring more debt for this purpose, has not changed, maintaining its unsustainable nature and which reached 130% of GDP and a burden of €60,000 million interest between 2014 and 2020; a national production setback due to deindustrialisation, the implosion of construction and the new constraints on agriculture and fisheries, significant being the fact that the amount of fish landed by the national fleet in 2014 was the lowest since statistics came into being; an investment that has dropped to about half in five years and must not be mistaken with foreign capital circulating in privatisations; an external balance without any sustainable changes, where any increase of exports is offset by imports; a domestic market that, with fluctuations, remains under paralysis.

     The Central Committee considers that the continuation of the right-wing policy deepened the structural dependence and submission of the economy to the interests of monopolies, mostly transnational, and determined the subordination of the political power to economic power. The great majority of capital in PT, EDP, REN, GALP, BPI, BCP, BRISA, CTT, ANA and CIMPOR is in the hands of foreign interests. Business deals ruinous to national interests, such as the looting by the PPPs, the privatisation of TAP and the handing to big business of other public transport companies continues. The planned handing to big business of public companies in the environmental area, including the privatisation of EGF and the fusion of multi-municipal systems of water supply and sanitation and their opening to private capital, continues.

     The privatisations rebuilt monopolies that today dominate the economy to the detriment of the national interest. Massive profits leaving the country continue to grow, the State lost tax revenue and dividends of privatised companies, with the resulting deterioration of the budget deficit. Privatisations reduced the State’s capacity to intervene in land planning, to combat asymmetries and to promote balanced development.

     The work of the BES/GES [Parliamentary] Inquiry Commission, proposed by the PCP, which has now ended, brought into focus the predatory nature and operating criteria of banking and monopoly groups and the fictional nature of “regulation,” as well as the imperative of public control of the banks, as a condition for a sovereign economic development policy of the country.

     2. The Central Committee considers that the worsening of living conditions, low wages and pensions, unemployment, precariousness, cuts in the number of recipients of important social payments—such as the solidarity supplement for the elderly, social insertion income, the prenatal allowance, and child benefit—the impoverishment of the workers and the people, created a dramatic social situation: 2,700,000 Portuguese live below the poverty line; in these five years jobs were reduced by half a million, and the unemployed, in a broad sense, increased from 653,000 to 1,200,000; 35% of the youth are unemployed, and only 23% of the unemployed receive benefits; half a million Portuguese were driven from the country into emigration on a scale unparalleled since records began. The policies of fiscal injustice and social inequalities deepen.

     A significantly worse picture with the reconfiguring of the State at the service of monopoly capital continues to weaken the public Social Security system, disrupts the National Health Service and its ability to respond, degrades Public Schools, devalues the Scientific and Technological System, downgrades Culture, deeply hurts the autonomy of Local Government, and undermines the rendering of public services and their universal character with the attempt to impose the so-called ‘municipalisation.” The cuts of thousands of millions of euros in the social functions of the State, to which they wish to add a new cut of €380 million in public services and €600 million in Social Security, deepened the path of destruction and degradation of public services and the privatisation of essential services and strategic companies, which weaken and suppress the social rights of the Portuguese.

     3. The attack on workers’ rights is what best identifies the class nature of the right-wing policies of PSD, CDS, and PS. This attack, in particular to impose more unpaid work time, deregulation, more precariousness, unemployment, and cuts in wages, rights and social protection, is the cornerstone of the worsening of the exploitation of workers to serve the interests of monopoly capital. The continuing offensive against the 35-hour working week and the attack on collective bargaining to “settle accounts” with labour achievements won with the April Revolution continue and threaten to intensify.

     4. The Central Committee considers that, in recent years, the domination of the economic power on political power and the deterioration of democratic rule was enhanced. The Portuguese were dispossessed of the power to make decisions on crucial issues of national life, transferred to the European Union structures with the Stability Pact, the Budget Treaty, economic governance, choices contrary to national interests but supported by PS, PSD and CDS, who legitimised foreign intervention in the country and implemented a foreign and defence policy of subordination to imperialism, draining democracy and national independence and sovereignty.

     The series of cases such as the “golden visas,” the horse-trading of financial speculation, corruption scandals, promiscuity between public office and private interests, situations that led to the resignation of members of the government and are in conflict with the Constitution of the Republic, express the degradation of the democratic regime and undermine the normal functioning of institutions, which should have led to the government's resignation long ago.

     In recent years PSD/CDS, under the umbrella of PS, have increased the violations of rights and freedoms, blocked and denied the negotiation of collective bargaining, limited the right to strike and the rights of assembly, demonstration, and propaganda, and now try new measures to legalise discrimination, namely of PCP-PEV, in the media coverage of election campaigns. In Justice the government worsened its attempts to interfere in investigations, disqualified the Judicial Police, and enhanced the class nature of justice, inaccessible to the workers and the population, aggravated by the closure of courts and the attack on the independence of the judiciary. The Armed Forces have been removed from their constitutional role, and core aspects of the military condition were undermined. Disinvestment in the security of the population, concentration of personnel, closure of police stations and the degradation of working conditions continued. Intelligence Services are free from any democratic control and are involved in the tapping and unlawful interception of communications, which the government and PS are now trying to legalise, despite the blatant unconstitutionality of their proposal.

     The Central Committee denounces the manoeuvres of the PSD/CDS government with the complicity of the President, as was once again shown in the celebrations of 10 June, to evade their responsibility for the country’s situation, the harmful consequences of their action and the projects to continue, the widespread condemnation and loss of their social base of support to which their policy has led and will lead to defeat.

     5. The Central Committee alerts the people to the plan to enhance the main pillars of the European Union—in particular its intervention in terms of NATO and the Economic and Monetary Union—which, if materialised, would represent the deepening of its federalist, neo-liberal and militaristic nature and increased and more severe limitations on national sovereignty.

     The Central Committee alerts the people to the dangers of imperialism’s belligerent offensive in Europe, as exemplified by the reinforcement of NATO forces in Eastern Europe and their continuing military exercises, like the ones announced at the end of September in Portugal, Spain and Italy, which the PCP has already condemned.

     The Central Committee condemns the process of interference and blackmail by the European Union and the IMF against the Greek people and their options, which seek to impose the continuation and intensification of a policy at the service of big business and the directory of EU powers, a policy that is at the root of the catastrophic economic and social situation in that country.

     The Central Committee condemns the unacceptable posture of alignment by the PSD/CDS government and the President of the Republic in this process of pressure against the Greek people, which is contrary to the interests of the people and the country.

     In view of the developments of the situation, when it is announced that a referendum is to be held in Greece on 5 July and destabilising factors multiply, the PCP reaffirms its strong condemnation of the manoeuvres by the European Union and the IMF against that country.

     This process confirms that the “European Union's cohesion and solidarity” does not exist. The so-called “negotiations” and the decisions of the Euro Group, the EU and the IMF were never interested in solving the serious problems of the people and the economy but in imposing greater and more brutal exploitation of the Greek workers and people and a new extortion of the resources of that country. Having the euro as one of its main instruments of economic and political domination by big business, the European Union does not hesitate in trampling hypocritically proclaimed fundamental values—such as democracy—humiliating and crushing the sovereign will of a people while trying to perpetuate policies of exploitation of workers and the favouring of big business.

     The PCP reaffirms its solidarity with the Greek workers and people, who resist and struggle against the impositions of the European Union and the IMF, demanding respect for their right to take sovereign options in defence of their rights and interests.

     The PCP reaffirms that the seriousness of the situation and the violence of the offensive against the people demands a firm stance to defend sovereignty in face of the instruments of domination by the EU and big business.

     In the year that marks the seventieth anniversary of the victory over Nazi fascism, the Central Committee salutes and stresses the importance of the struggle of the workers and people who, under very diverse conditions, resist the offensive by big business, particularly in Europe, where numerous struggles have taken place, to stand against the violent social regression that the European Union wants to impose.

     6. The Central Committee considered that, in the regional elections of Madeira on 29 March, CDU gained an important result, increasing in percentage (5.54%), in the number of votes (7,060) and electing two MPs. The results of the regional elections confirm the positive conditions for the intervention and strengthening of the PCP and CDU in the Autonomous Region of Madeira and constitute a factor of stronger confidence in CDU throughout the country, in the preparation of the legislative elections.

     7. The Central Committee highlights the development of the mass struggle that took place in the past months, in particular the national day of struggle on 7 March, promoted by CGTP-IN, with demonstrations all over the country, the commemorations of 8 March—International Women's Day—the national march "Youth on the march—Work with rights! Against precariousness and exploitation,” which culminated in the demonstration on 28 March in Lisbon, the national day of struggle promoted by MURPI [retired and pensioners’ movement] on 11 April throughout the country, the commemorations of 25 April and the grand commemorations of 1 May.

     The Central Committee salutes the struggles developed by diverse sectors, highlighting the national strike of Public Administration Workers on 13 March; the strikes of the nurses, public health workers, non-teaching staff, and prison guards; the teachers’ demonstration on 20 June; and the rally on 26 June promoted by the Common Front of Public Administration Trade Unions. The struggle in the transport sector, namely by STCP, Carris, Lusbon Subway, EMEF, Refer, CP, CP Carga, Atlantic Ferries, and railway companies of passenger and commodity transport, and in numerous companies and sectors, namely hotels, Renault Cacia, EFACEC and BA Vidro, and the initiative Culture in Struggle, promoted by more than sixty organisations, with expression in Almada, Coimbra and Lisboa.

     In these processes of struggle, the unity, determination and combativeness of the workers stood out, in their confrontation against the actions of the government and bosses, resisting the offensive and achieving objectives such as increases in wages, the defence of work schedules, the defeat of repressive actions and the promotion to permanent contract of workers with precarious contracts.

     The Central Committee highlights the importance of the development of action and struggle by workers and populations in defence of the interests and rights and improvement of their living conditions, an intrinsic element of the rupture with the right-wing policy and the achievement of a patriotic left-wing policy that answers their needs and concerns and puts the country on the path of progress and social justice.

III—CDU: The strength of the people for a patriotic and left-wing policy

     1. The Central Committee reaffirms the importance of the next elections for the Republican Assembly, given its significance in the struggle for a rupture with the right-wing policy and the construction of an alternative patriotic and left-wing policy—elections of unmistakable significance for all those committed to ensuring, by rupture with the right-wing policy, the conditions for giving answer to the country’s problems, stopping and reversing the dangerous and disquieting continuing path of exploitation, impoverishment, and national decline.

     This importance is confirmed by the projects that, more or less covertly, the parties of the right-wing policy—PS, PSD, and CDS—are preparing in order to perpetuate, with this or that marginal change, the essence of the policy of exploitation, impoverishment and dependence that has led the country to economic decline and social regression. Despite insistent and artificial manoeuvres to attempt to present the electoral programmes of PS and PSD/CDS in confrontation, the truth is that they are based on the same premises and orientations that are at the origin of the policy of crushing the incomes and rights of the workers and people imposed by the Growth and Stability Pacts of the PS and the Aggression Pact signed by PS, PSD and CDS-PP with the foreign troika—programmes that, departing from identical options regarding the noose of the debt, the budgetary rules imposed by the European Union, the subordination of power to monopoly capital, lead to identical consequences regarding the continuity, with this or that difference in rhythm, reduction of the real value of wages and pensions, in new cuts in social functions, the maintenance of grave labour norms and the expiry of collective contracts, the accentuation of precariousness in work relations, pursuing the alienation of strategic sectors, in the continuation of fiscal injustice.

     2. The presentation on 7 July next of the Electoral Programme of PCP, aimed at achieving an alternative policy, patriotic and left-wing, therefore assumes redoubled importance—a Programme based on national life and reality, founded on popular aspirations and interests, built in the course of months (before and after the National Meeting held on 28 February) in multiple initiatives aimed at receiving the contribution of numerous organisations, democrats, and patriots, a Programme, as was shown on 26 March, that in its essential objectives and axes proves that there is a solution to the national problems, that there is a policy capable of ensuring the development of the country, of social progress, elevating the living conditions of workers and people.

     This is a Programme of rupture that assumes, faced with the confrontation with constraints and conditions that compromise the right of Portugal to a sovereign development, the clear option for the rights of workers and the Portuguese people, for national independence and sovereignty, for the affirmation of values and principles enshrined in the Republican Constitution.

     It is a Programme that assumes a rupture with the power of monopoly capital, with submission to the European Union and with its instruments of domination, as a necessary and indispensable condition towards the affirmation of a Portugal with a future.

     It is an unpostponable rupture with the right-wing policy that opens the way towards building an alternative, patriotic and left-wing policy, constitutes a national imperative, a condition for ensuring a Portugal with a future, of social justice and progress, a sovereign and independent country—a policy capable of liberating Portugal from dependence and submission, recovering for the country that which belongs to the country, to return rights, wages and incomes to the workers and people. These are the objectives the Electoral Programme of PCP inscribes and whose achievement will be all the closer the stronger the political and electoral influence of PCP and CDU.

     3. The powerful National March of 6 June, called by CDU PCP-PEV, constitutes an expression of convergence of democrats and patriots and a great affirmation of the strength of the people and what it represents as a testimony of what is in the hands of the workers and people, in their confidence, their determination and will, to give expression to the construction of a real alternative policy.

     The Central Committee reaffirms its complete availability to broaden the convergence of democrats, patriots and all forces sincerely committed to building an alternative policy, a convergence built upon a clear programme of rupture with the right-wing policy and the affirmation of a Portugal with a future, a convergence all the more possible and achievable the broader the political and electoral strength and influence of CDU. A necessary and irreplaceable force in the achievement of an alternative policy, PCP reaffirms that, with its project, action and coherence, it is ready to assume all the responsibilities that the Portuguese people may attribute to it towards achieving that policy and in the government of the country.

     4. The successful achievement of the national action of contacts and information launched at the beginning of the month, the development of the initiatives of “dialogue and action” and the meetings “in the locality and the country, solutions for a better life,” the projection and valuing of the CDU candidacies, together with a programming that ensures an ample contact in the priority sectors and locations and in the new poles of presence during the summer period, constitute central elements for realising the electoral campaign. The Central Committee of PCP appeals to its activists and the organisations of PCP and JCP, the activists of CDU, to build a campaign based on mobilisation with confidence, in actions of direct contact that allows the presentation of solutions for the country, that broadens the debate and the contribution on the necessary alternative policy to answer the national problems, that broadens the current and breadth of support that CDU gives expression to, that affirms with confidence the possibility of alternative, patriotic and left-wing policy.

IV—Reinforce the Party organisation and influence

     1. The Central Committee emphasises the intense, profound and broad intervention developed by the Party over the last months, responding to the situation and taking the initiative, and points to the need to energise the political intervention and mass struggle.

     The Central Committee appeals, following the important dynamic of action of CDU that had a notable expression in the National March “The strength of the people,” to continuing and intensifying an intervention with confidence, the development of a large political campaign of clarification and mobilisation, towards the reinforcement of CDU PCP-PEV in the elections for the Republican Assembly, an indispensable condition for the rupture with the right-wing policy and achieving a patriotic and left-wing policy.

     The Central Committee emphasises the priority given to the preparation of the thirty-ninth Avante! Festival on 4–6 September and emphasises the development of the national fund-raising campaign “More space, More Festa. Future with April” and the importance of measures to pursue and broaden the advance being verified.

     2. The Central Committee reaffirms the importance and actuality of the work directions indicated in the Resolution “More organisation, more intervention, more influence. A stronger PCP” and emphasises the important success obtained.

     It emphasises the advance verified in the action of contacts with members of the Party to elevate militancy, deliver the Party membership card and update information, already terminated or close to it in some organisations, with delays in others, and the positive results of its realisation, and raises the need to pursue this work and adopt new measures regarding cadres and leadership to conclude this action in all organisations.

     It emphasises the great success of the national recruitment campaign “The values of April in the future of Portugal,” with 2,127 new activists, surpassing the fixed objective of 2,000, with political significance and an importance addition of new forces and capacities to the party collective that is necessary to fully take advantage of, ensuring the recruiting of new activists (defining with each one the party organism they will join and the task they will develop). The situation we are living in places the necessity and importance of pursuing a broad work of recruitment of new militants, realising the existing potential.

     The Central Committee registers advances in other lines of work towards reinforcing the Party and emphasises the importance of allocating responsibilities to cadres, structuring the work with the masses, in particular the reinforcement of the organisation and intervention in companies and work-places, distributing the party press and propaganda, measures to ensure the financial independence of the Party.

     3. The Central Committee appeals to the Party organisations and activists, trusting in the working class, the workers, the youth and Portuguese people, to develop the mass struggle, broaden political intervention, to turn the preparation for the legislative elections into a large political campaign of the masses, to clarify and mobilise the vote in CDU, a battle of great importance towards the rupture with the right-wing policy and the affirmation of a patriotic and left-wing policy, rooted in the values of April.