About the electoral results in Greece

In Greece 27 lists of political parties and organisations took part in the EP elections on 7th June. KKE gathered 428,283 votes, 8.35% and elected 2 members of the European Parliament (in this term the MEPs of Greece have been reduced to 22 from 24 previously).

A high abstention rate, approximately by 47%, was recorded in these elections, leading to a reduction of the votes of all parties comparing to the results of parliamentary elections in 2007 and the EP elections in 2004.

On 8th June the CC held a session in order to elaborate a first assessment on the results of the EP elections on 7th June 2009. The CC summed up its initial conclusions and promoted the process of discussion within the party and general with friends and supporters of the Party as well as with people who cooperate and struggle along with the Party.

The CC extended militant greetings to the members of the Party and KNE, the friends and supporters of the Party, the people cooperating with KKE who worked hard and struggled along with the communists for the battle of the EP elections and notes that: “the multifaceted political and mass activity of the Party developed under particularly hard and complicated conditions that have to do with the economic crisis and the system’s elaborated strategy for the management of the people’s indignation; it constitutes a significant basis and offers new positive experiences”.

Furthermore the CC estimates that: “to a great extent these elections approach the character of the battle of the parliamentary elections. It has been the most complicated and hard EP elections battle over the last 25 years; it took place under the conditions of the contradictory impact of the economic capitalist crisis on the consciousness and the stance of the working people. The reliable yardstick for this battle is the result of the parliamentary elections in 2007 and to a lesser extent the results of the EP elections in 2004 as they were held after the national elections and under different political conditions”.

The Central Committee underlined that KKE managed to confront the strategy elaborated in the ranks of the system in the period 2007-2009 until the eve of the elections that aimed at delivering an electoral and political blow on KKE and at its displacement from the 3rd position. Apart from the fierce attacks by the mass media, there were also continuous efforts to present by fabricated surveys that the political power of KKE was shrinking either below SYRIZA, the “new-left” welter, or below the “new” party of ecologists-greens. At the same time the leaderships of the ultra-right LAOS (Popular Orthodox Rally) and social-democrat PASOK launched a provocative attack against KKE. They tried, without producing any evidence and resorting to dirty tricks and lies, to slander KKE and present it as involved in scandals that shake the bourgeois parties over the last years, aiming at affecting the acknowledged morality of the communists and the confidence they enjoy among the people.

This anticommunist attack took place at a time when both ND and PASOK parties proved to be dipped into scandals and at the same time a large part of the people was disappointed by the consequences of the capitalist restructurings and generally the policy of the EU. The slanderous campaign was realized with the active support and, in certain cases, the tolerance of the rest of the parties as well as of part of the media. However, anti-communism is not a Greek phenomenon; its source lies within the EU institutions and most of its member-states, through the equation of fascism with communism and with persecutions in several countries.

To a great extent this attack failed to accomplish its goals. However, it did put obstacles to the dynamic of the Party in conditions of the mass abstention.

The CC communiqué underscored that escalation of the attack has been motivated especially by the confirmed ideological-political unity of the Party which was further forged in the 18th Congress with the effort to draw important concussions and lessons from the course of the socialist construction in the 20th Century that constitute the starting point for the revival of the struggle for socialism.

KKE faced straightforwardly the provocations, proving its experience, strength and proof. It prevented to some extend the vote of resistance and counterattack to be directed to parties of painless protest that the ruling class uses as obstacles to peoples radicalization.

The CC of KKE evaluates as “positive the final result achieved by KKE taking into consideration the above mentioned factors”. We reach the conclusion that “significant part voters of KKE during the last years, especially in the 2007 elections, are new voters that in the meantime we have not managed to get in contact with, to extend and deepen our bonds and, of course, contribute so that they systematically take part in the struggles. We must develop reciprocal and close ideological and political bonds that constitute the most important factor of resistance in complex and difficult conditions.”

Among others, the CC notes that “the electoral result and the conditions in general require the utmost vigilance. No rest. The economic and political establishment in the country and the imperialist centers will not give in easily as their objective is to deliver a blow to KKE. The anti-communist attack will continue with dirty tricks, by all means and ways. They aim at the dynamic of KKE and mainly at the role it can carry out in the near future in the development of the class struggle that constitutes the impetus for all positive developments”.

Furthermore, the CC of KKE considers that “in the following period the attack against workers, people’s rights and KKE will intensify; the slanderous attacks and dilemmas aiming to intimidate will increase. The resistance, the counterattack and the development of essential ideological and political bonds will be determined within the labor movement and generally the popular movement through all its expressions. The bonds of the Party with the working class and the popular strata, as well as the bonds of the militant bodies of the movement with their members and generally the workers must grow stronger” (…).

“Today, more than ever, the great importance of the organized collective struggle is highlighted. The individual protest, the effort of each one to find individual solutions to the impasses is not only ineffective but also detrimental because it postpones the struggle that needs to be conducted today fomenting illusions and fatality. The collective responsibility is significant, though, in order to develop and bear results it must be based even more on the awareness of individual responsibility, on the constant contribution of each communist, of each member of KNE, of each person who struggles”.

The CC expresses the need, in a spirit of militant optimism, to “assess the difficulties and opportunities that involve the consistent action according to Party’s strategy and the elaborated specialization in each area, industry and region. It calls upon the wider working class, the working people, regardless of political beliefs and preferences, to defend KKE against any slanderous attack taking into account that the anti-communist action and hysteria inflict blows against the popular movement in general”.

Info by the International Relations Section