Celebrating the overthrow of the Caetano dictatorship in April 1974 This weekend two very different Portuguese solidarity conferences are taking place.
In Oporto the so-called Committee for the Defence of Democracy in Portugal' will be meeting at the invitation of Socialist Party leader Mario Soares. Social democratic leaders from all over Europe the prime ministers of West Germany, Holland, Denmark, Sweden, and Austria, as well as a representative of the British Labour Party Their purpose: to assess the progress of their international campaign to restore capitalist stability to Portugal.
WORKERS' STRUGGLE But in London an entirely different kind of conference will be meeting with the aim of frustrating the capitalists' and social democratic leaders' plans and aiding the development of the workers' struggles in Portugal. This is the national delegate conference called by the Solidarity Campaign with the Portuguese Working Class and sponsored by a number of trade union leaders and Labour MPs.
An organised solidarity campaign will be able to develop links between shop floor workers in Britain and workers in Portugal - links which have already begun to be developed through exchange visits between representatives of the workers commissions in Portugal and shop stewards committees in this country.
This is particularly important in the case of the multi-nationals, which draw their strength precisely from their international character. Early information, passed from a workers commission in one subsidiary to a shop stewards committee in another subsidiary can and already has in some instances enabled early action against some move by the bosses against the workers. Delegates of the bodies set up in Portugal to facilitate joint action between workers in different plants should be brought into working contact with solidarity conference including are expected to attend.
interference INSET: comrade Bernard of the LCI similar bodies in this country. Close links between such committees can have a big effect in aiding workers in all countries by monitoring and exchanging information, exchanging and developing experiences of struggle, and co-ordinating acts of solidarity.
British capitalism, together with European capitalism, has intervened at every level in Portugal to assist the right-wing forces there. . The solidarity campaign must document evidence of economic manipulation, boycott and sabotage; get support from trade union and Labour Party branches; and put as much pressure as possible on the British Government to end its - especially through its support of the reactionary forces in Portugal and through its imposition of import controls. It must also set out with determination to redress the balance on Portugal in the flow and type of information by fighting the bias in TV, radio, and the newspapers and by producing its own newsletters, and bulletins, holding meetings, showing films, distributing leaflets, etc.
BUILD THE CAMPAIGN It is not only the internationalist duty of all revolutionary organisations and militants active in the working class movement to support the Portuguese revolution through building this campaign, it is also a chance to demonstrate in pracuice tne mternational nature or capitalism and of revolution. Our day to day struggle against the effects of the economic crisis and against the anti-working policies of the Labour Government will be strengthened by a united campaign to co-ordinate activity and collectively learn from the Portuguese experience.
The solidarity conference takes place this Saturday, 13 March, from 10am to 6pm in Conway Hall, Red Lion Square. Observers are welcome as well as any last minute affiliations to the campaign and notification of delegates. Further information from SCPWC, 12. Little Newport Street, London WC2 (01-439 3006). HDE of militancy. ber?
fascist officers. prepared to accept. police.
MISSIONS Lof the events of 25 Noven What has been the impac ber on the class struggle?
These events marked a partial adefeat for the Portuguese working class. After 25 November the vanguard was totally demoralised, but there was also a general feeling that it was necessary to respond to the attacks of the ruling class.
Now we can say that a new cycle of struggles is already beginning, and we can see a new upsurge This shows that the working class is not completely defeated and that the Portuguese revolution has by no means ended. have occurred since Novem What exemplary struggles Since November there have been A many meetings of the trade unions against the high cost of living and unemployment, as well as demonstrations for the release of antiThere has also been a very important struggle against redundan. cies in the multinational firm of Timex, near Lisbon. For the first time in Portugal, this struggle has raised the question of the nationalisation of a multinational - which the ruling class were obviously not Now the boss has retreated, but they will certainly try to push through the redundancies after the elections, since the factory is already on a three day week.
There have also been a number of struggles against the suspension of wage negotiations by the Government, for example, that of the shop workers of Lisbon. This has been a very hard struggle and has involved violent clashes with the What is the state of the workers commissions?
Aot the working class - the trade Despite November, the organs unions and the workers commissions - have kept their strength The workers commissions in fac tories running under workers management have now established a national coordinating commission.
Obviously the ruling class wants to finish with the commissions, or at least to 'legalise' them - that is, to integrate them into the capitalist system and halt their capacity to apply workers control. Thus the attacks of the ruling class ag ainst the mass organisations of the working class have primarily been directed against the workers com • The LCI calls for a nationa congress of the workers com missions and democratic trade Can you explain that?
The principal problem of the d Portuguese revolution is, without any doubt, the problem of the cen10p OUR STRUGGLE SUPPORT SOLIDARITY CAMPAIGN tralisation of the organs of the working class — the workers com missions and the trade unions. In calling for a national congress, we are calling for the national central isation of the organs representing the masses, in order to elaborate a plan of action against the attacks of the ruling class We also say that the majority currents in these congresses must form a workers and peasants government to implement the programme decided by the congresses.
Concerning the democratic congress of all the trade unions, it is necessary to add a few points. In Portugal at the moment there is a debate within the workers move ment on the question of trade union unity. The trade union movement is split between the unions which are controlled by the Communist Party and grouped around Intersindical, and the other unions, especially white collar unions, which follow the line of the Socialist Party The slogan of a democratic conference of all the unions is a concre tisation of our united front tactic for the unification of the trade union movement, and against the 'democratic' demagogy of the social democrats and the bureaucratic manoeuvres of the Stalinists.
What is the present state o the independent soldier movement and the Armed Forces Movement?
It was the independent soldiers a movement that was hardest hit by 25 November. The ruling class has virtually closed the barracks in Lisbon and disbanded the regiments. The soldiers committees have disappeared, and so has the SUV (Soldiers United Will Win).
Now the project of the military hierarchy is to professionalise the army - in other words, to break all possibility of an independent movement of soldiers and transform the army into a repressive force against the workers In this situation the AFM has practically disappeared. We in the .CI had already predicted this outcome, because we characterised the AFM as a petty bourgeois movement which had gone through a series of splits after 25 April 1974.
JUST OUT! Looks at the development of the Portu guese revolutionary pro cess in some detail and charts the way forward for the solidarity campaign. 10p plus 8p p&p from RED BOOKS, 97 Caledonian Road, N. 1.
1 March 1976 Now even the bourgeoisie does not want the AFM to remain on the political scene, because it has adequate political representatives in the bourgeois parties, the PPD and the CDS.
• What impact have the recen struggles had on the Socialist Party?
After 25 November we have begun ato see the embryo of an opposition tendency to the Soares leadership in the SP. It is still very weak, but it results from the empirical understanding of some of the SP base of the politics of its leadership during the last period, who have supported the bourgeoisie's attacks.
For example, in the last elecUnion (UDP).
This is the strongest organisation of the far left in Portugal, and it has a different political line to the other Maoist organisations. It considers that fascism and imperialism are the 'principal enemy' and it is prepared to have unity of action with the other organisations of the - which the other Maoist sects refuse, as they think that all the other organisations of the far left are 'agents of social fascism', that is to say, agents of the CP.
There are also the centrist organisations, like the Revolutionary Party of the Proletariat (PRP) and the Left Socialist Movement (MES). The MES was in its origins a totally heterogeneous organisation -made up of Catholies, anarchists, Luxemburgists, 'independents' and so on. Now the leadership of the Workers Party (PRT). and their present conquests.
The last conference of the LCI passed a resolution for a fusion with another Trotskyist group, the Revolutionary a which exists mainly in Lisbon The PRT is a small organisation in the high schools, and which supports the Fourth International. Our last national congress voted to fuse with the comrades of the PRT. Now we are preparing the posibility of a joint election campaign and other joint actions to prepare the fusion.
Can you explain the significance of the elections for the ruling class and how the LCI is approaching the question?
The ruling class wants to legalise Aits project of an authoritarian government. We think that the results of the election will give the bourgeois parties a majority, and that the ruling class will expel the CP from the Government and attempt to establish a bonapartist regime against the workers' struggles It is for this reason that the LCI is going to participate in the forthcoming elections in all electoral districts. In this way we can help to prepare a unified response by the
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TGWU TER NATIONAL ALCO
Interview with Central Comm nist League ( L tion of the Fou
New IMG- pamphlet
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mrade Bernard, a member of the ee of the Internationalist Commu- - Portuguese sympathising sec-