Colonel Costa Bras was invited Dy Soares to take over the Ministry of the Interior, responsible for organising the GNR and the PSP, the two sections of the para-military police responsible Tor nunCTous workes cerus over me past monuis. And LL.col rurmino Miguel-once Spinola's nominee for Prime Minister-moves into the Defence Ministry. WAGE FREEZE So far Soares has avoided mention. ing directly the need to freeze wages. ne knows Tul wel mat such a declaration would unleash a massive upsurge of workers' struggles. Instead Photo: JOAO BAFFO (ELI Another section of the march he is attempting to cobble together a proiect well known to British workersa 'social pact' between the government acmeve success m tus sea soares must come to grips with the Intersindical trade union federation and the Communist Party.
The Intersindical, which organises some 1½ million workers, most of them in the key industries-shipbuilding. civil construction, iron and steel, transport, etc-has now taken up the demand for a national minimum wage of 5,000 escudos (£90) per month. with a price freeze on all basic commodities. Such a demand, wnle not going nearly tar enough, 1s something that Portuguese capitalism Intersindical has threatened to unleash When the CP makes threatening noises it does so in order to satisfy the militancy of its base, to regain the electoral support it lost during the presidential elections to Otelo, and to the stability of the new Government.
However, most important for the CP is the question of the control of the trade union movement. Intersindical •s cemaname me sento nevonate tor all trade unions but Soares is set on widening the gap between those trade unions affiliated to the Intersindical and those who are independent (mostly service industry unions led by the SP). With all the key industries SILA PRA PS unionised (closed shops) and afiliated ro me ntersmarca. ne coule race trouble here. So prospects for a 'social pact' are slim.
It is obvious that the interests of the Portuguese working class are the Last thing to be taken into consideration in this inter-bureaucratic/reformist manoeuvring. And of course it is of the utmost importance that the control of the trade union movement lies in the hands of the workers themselves, and not in those of distant bureaucrats as is the-ease rt the-moment.
From this point of view the democratic organisation of the trade unions is crucial. However, it is not only the hard lipe Stalinist bureaucrats of the Intersindical who are opposed to workers Gemocracy. Dur aiso cenensis like the MES (Left Socialist Movement). the Portuguese trade union movement, which means pluralism, divisions and the introduction of a bourgeois cancer into workers organisations.' But it is precisely the open and continuous debate on all questions of tendencies inside the trade unions that in itself is the best guarantee that would result from the organisation against bourgeois infiltration. And it is The conception of a federation of unions, directly controlled by the workers, with the right to form tendencies, is being put forward by the Communist League (LCI) in the debate on the forthcoming trade union congress. As they point out in their paper Luta Proletaria; of a class struggle tendency goes hand ing for the tolowing demanas. agalst any 'social pact"; for the democratic organisation of the unions; for an across-the-board increase for all of 2,000 escudos (£36) per month; for a sliding scale of wages; for a 35 hour week; for full employment. That is the only way to ound a lignang oppostac! to the pro-capitalist policies of the Soares Government.