Radical – internationalist front for the battle of the European Elections

Radical – internationalist front for the battle of the European Elections

from: Dimitris Desyllas, member of the National Coordination Committee of ANTARSYA and former member of the European Parliament, NAR

We are in a prolonged election period. On May 26, 2019, European elections will be held along with municipal and regional elections in Greece, perhaps also along with parliamentary elections. Despite the particularity of each of them, it is an "all-matter" confrontation, with the stance towards the EU being a crucial point.

This is an overall political battle of enormous significance: for the political balance in Greece and across Europe. For the political prospect of the Left, especially the Radical factions. For the interests of workers. For the future of the youth. In front of the battle of the European Elections, the main political fronts that will confront each other have already been set up.

First: The "euroskeptic", far-right – fascist, anti-EU front of Salvini - Orban – Le Pen - AfD - Golden Dawn. With the "internationalist" aid and guidance of the American Steve Bannon. A racist - anti-immigrant – nationalist front. Dangerous for the workers’ and popular interests.

The forces which comprise it are rapidly rising across Europe. But why?

The causes are many and interrelated:

-The international, historical, structural crisis of capitalism, and its heavy consequences on workers and the broad popular strata.

-The deep crisis of the EU and its barbaric policy, with the memoranda and the usurious loans, the reactionary reforms deriving from the "Stability Pact", the CΑP, the suffocating Euro-guardianship and finally the violation and mockery of any form of people's sovereignty.

-The heated intra-imperialist contradictions outside and within the EU (Brexit, Italy’s budget, etc.).

-The abolishment of the last remnants of the "welfare state" and their replacement by caricatures of social policy.

- The intra-labor "class civil war" and the fear of the immigrants and refugees which is cultivated in a smart way by the bourgeoisie.

-The ridiculement of the neo-conservative social-democracy (e.g. SPD, PASOK).

-The bankruptcy of any reformist policy.

-The general crisis of the bourgeois policy.

-The degeneration, the collapse and the political sepsis of the "Euro-lustfull" Left.

-But most of all, it is about the lack of a total left-wing, anti-EU "rival awe". The blatant absence of a mass, working, anti-capitalist - anti-imperialist - anti-government - internationalist Left.

This pan-European gap and absence is exploited by the far-right, fascist, anti-EU front. For this reason, it is able to exploit, distort, incorporate and nullify the popular anti-EU stance that is developing throughout Europe.

Matteo Salvini during his recent, first official visit to Moscow, said:

"We are penalizing Russia and, on the other hand, we are financing and trying to integrate in the EU a foreign country -Turkey- which has placed one of the 27 EU members –Cyprus- under military occupation. This is something inconceivable"!

Salvini is winning politically and in the elections because he is saying what the Italian and, in general, the European Left has forgotten and does not say! It is a great political mistake to underestimate the pan-European electoral rise of the far right and to compare it with the massive anti-fascist rallies. The elections and the overall political influence is one thing, and the massive antifascist rallies are another. There is no direct match between them, as some people think.

Second: The pro-EU – antifascist front in its various appearances. It has been originally set up in Germany, with the "Rise Up" Movement, by the duo of Sarah Wagenknecht and Oscar Lafontain, with the participation of the Social Democrats, the Greens and Die Linke.

They say that they seek to limit the influence of AfD, while adopting much of their anti-immigrant agenda! Their main objective is the future co-government of these forces in Germany. They present this "front" as a political "recipe" for the whole Europe. It is no coincidence that all German parties (including Die Linke) have established, funded and led branches of their theoretical-ideological institutes in Greece and in every EU country to infuse their policy in the respective parties. It is a multifaceted and brutal intervention in the domestic political life of each country.

The pro-EU, anti-fascist front, with its variations in every EU country, is in a different way, hostile to workers' and popular interests as it stutters, castrates, integrates and finally cancels the deeper anti-EU labor and popular trends, in the name of anti-fascism!

Third: The dominant and aggressive, neo-liberal pro-EU front of the deeper capitalist and imperialist EU integration. With the well-known Junker-Macron-Tsipras reactionary proposals: for a European Monetary Fund (in the place of FSM), a Banking Union and a tax “convergence”, supporting the establishment of a super-Minister of Finance and a separate budget together with a Parliament (!) of the Eurozone, a stronger European Army and an autonomous military-imperialist EU integration, next to that of NATO. Their proposals and decisions on a new, overtly racist EU policy towards immigrants. With the empowerment of the Frontex with 10,000 more people, its three times higher funding, (35 billion € for the 2021-2027 period) and a full autonomy vis-à-vis the EU member states. This is the "left" federalism of SYRIZA and his European allies.

The "EU correction" fronts which seek to make it "more equitable, fairer, more democratic, more ecological" (Varoufakis-type fronts DiEM 25) are also included in the same category of the aggressive pro-EU powers. However, the tough reality has shown that the EU cannot become a union of "workers and peoples".

The EU has become a real prison for Workers’ and People's Rights. It cannot be amended, modernized or reformed, but it can only be overturned by the anti-EU internationalist struggle of workers and peoples. This has been underlined by all the referenda that have been held so far (in Norway, Denmark, Ireland, France, the Netherlands, Cyprus, England).

In these circumstances, ANTARSYA and the broader radical left, must be clearly separated from the factions of the far right - fascist anti-EU Front on the one hand and from the pro-EU “anti-fascist” front on the other.

Only in this way can we fight victoriously against the dominant front, against the deepest essence of the barbaric policy of the EU and the political forces (SYRIZA – New Democracy and their satellites) that promote and apply it in our country.

We must promote not only autonomously but also as the main political objective of the mass popular movement, the disengagement from the EU always speaking from the point of view of the labor interests. This will be our specific form of national contribution to the internationalist duty for the dissolution of the capitalist-imperialist EU and the creation of another, workers’ socialist internationalization with a contemporary communist perspective in our region, in Europe and the world. This is a key political objective - a link to the anti-capitalist struggle and a way of approaching the revolution.

The political struggle for an anti-capitalist disengagement (exit) from the EU is now a "touchstone" for every political force, fighter of the struggling Left.

It is unacceptable to remain in the middle of the way, restricted and castrated (e.g. disengagement just from the Eurozone), adopting a logic of stages or supporting the allegedly "broader" electoral alliances, as other left forces do in practice.

We cannot also just stick to declarations for a blurry “people’s power” that will come without a revolution and thus leave the immediate objectives of the anti-EU struggle for some better future period. On the contrary, these immediate goals of the anti-EU struggle promote the subversive joint action of the struggling Left and help it establish relations with the workers, the peasantry and the popular movement.

Ahead of the European elections, ANTARSYA will take initiatives to build a permanent, not only electoral, anti-capitalist - anti-imperialist - anti-governmental - internationalist anti-EU front. With a broad and all-rounded anti-capitalist program. For a victorious response to the real dilemma of all the upcoming serious electoral battles. That is not "SYRIZA or New Democracy", "Tsipras or Mitsotakis", a barbaric governance by the more or less “sensitive” political factions of the bourgeoisie.

For the workers, the youth and the majority of the society the real dilemma is different:

-Expansion and escalation of the memorandum/capitalist barbarity and the threat of war, or their overthrow by a robust labor movement and a strong anti-capitalist Left?

-Enhancement of the bipolar system of bourgeois management (SYRIZA – New Democracy, with their respective satellites), or its weakening and defeat by a radical left opposition?

Will we contribute to a direct labor counter-attack by leading unified victorious struggles for the overthrow of the barbaric policy of the government – the EU – the IMF and the Capital?

In this battle our key political axes should be:

• The abolition of the long-term memorandum regime as well as the continuing and enhanced Euro-guardiance.

• The immediate abolition of the 714 memorandum-laws currently in force (the racist sub-salary for the youth, the auctions and seizures of popular property, the new cuts in pensions, and the tax-free limit for the people, etc.).

• The return of all the stolen income and rights together with a substantial reduction of the working time. Real increases in wages, salaries and pensions. Public - Free - Quality Education, health care system, welfare for all.

• For permanent - fully-insured work. Overthrow of the EU’s CAP, substantial reinforcement of the first-degree agricultural cooperatives.

• The deletion of the usurious and overpaid state-debt. Down with the privatizations – the sales of public wealth, organizations and services.

• The exit from the EU and NATO. Dissolution of the reactive axis of Greece - Israel - Egypt - Cyprus. Defense of the peace, against the war campaign of the capital.

• The fight for democratic liberties, for the political and social rights of our times, against the parliamentary totalitarianism, the EU commission and the oligarchs of the media. For the smashing of fascist and racist gangs.

Only in this way will there be a well-founded hope, that the growing workers’ indignation and youthful anger against the policy of the government, will not to turn to the various bourgeois and fascist fronts. On the contrary, this indignation and anger should find refuge in the Left so as to deepen, so as to become a real and threatening, total "rival awe" against the dominant bourgeois policy.

from: Dimitris Desyllas, member of the National Coordination Committee of ANTARSYA and former member of the European Parliament, NAR