Massive Rally of the KKE in Athens

The people’s guide must be its desire for a people’s victory

Thousands of workers, self-employed, young people, thousands of people who struggle for a living from every corner of Attica participated in the massive rally of the people which was organized by the KKE in the centre of Athens opposite the Parliament building, in Constitution Square.

The KKE escalates its political activity and intervention in this way in order to win over new working class and popular consciousnesses, in the direction of rupture with the power of capital, for its overthrow, for the acquisition of popular power, the construction of the people’s economy.

From the platform of the rally, the GS of the CC of the KKE, Aleka Papariga, presented the political proposal of the Party for a way out of the crisis in favour of the workers, the opening of a nationwide political campaign amongst the people, with this proposal at its very centre.

Aleka Papariga noted amongst other things that:

“This current period is a historic opportunity: The people must measure its strength, counterattack and defeat them in every individual state, must overthrow the power of the monopolies. We do not underestimate the importance of mobilizations on immediate pressing problems, in the factory, in the office, in the neighbourhood, in the municipality, and at a regional level. And we are in the frontline, everywhere, where we can reach.”

The GS of the CC of the KKE provided specific examples concerning the activity of the communists in the recent period and added that:

“The opponent operates strategically, and consequently the popular movement must answer strategically. The only true thing the Prime Minister said was that there is no time limit for the crisis’ duration. Half the Eurozone is being buffeted by the crisis, imperialists powers- the big beasts like the USA and others periodically undergo crises, from which they have not completely recovered. The deepest assimilation of Greece into the European capitalist market through its participation in the European Union even further sharpens the unevenness of the Greek capitalist economy, makes its management even more difficult. In the end there will be some sort of recovery for the capitalists, but not for the people’s living standards and the right of the people to work. It will be temporary. There will be a new cycle of crisis, even deeper than the one which we are experiencing today”.

Aleka Papariga stressed that: “For the struggles to be effective, a basic prerequisite is that the true cause of the crisis be understood. The cause of the Greek capitalist crisis is same as the cause of the 1929-33 crisis, the one at the beginning of the 1970s, the crisis in 1997 of the so-called Asian tigers, Russia’s in 1998, in Argentina and other Latin American countries, and a few years ago in the USA. From here on things will worsen if we do not work for a radical political change.

As long as capitalism develops, it will become more reactionary, inflexible to the demands of the people, barbaric, dangerous and parasitical. The cause of the economic crisis is the incentive of capitalist profit from the increasingly intense level of exploitation of the workers which is the driving force of production and the economy. The capitalists push the increase in production to its limits, because they desire super-profits. They produce in order to achieve profits and at the same time undermine the buying power of the workers. The workers enjoy even less both when profits increase and when they are reduced. They are the main losers in the phase of the crisis.

The debt both accompanies and is the result of the profitability of capital and it is on the increase in the conditions of the crisis. Consequently, what the government, ND and the other opposition parties are doing is focussing their proposals around the debt, which is nothing more than a deception and a mockery. It is a dangerous option for the people. This is one of the basic points which all the parties come together on despite differences on individual issues. They all come together on the position that the large businesses must be strengthened. They cannot and do not want to strike at the basic target”.

The GS of the CC of the KKE noted that “today’s developments in Greece place the general political question in the frontline. The question is whether the capitalist path of development, which will bring a new crisis cycle, is in the interests of the people or whether the people should choose a radically different path, such as the KKE proposes, to a society where crisis and exploitation, unemployment and insecurity will be things of the past. The matter of overthrowing the power of the monopolies, and not only a conservative government, is objectively in the frontline. Thus today it is vitally necessary for the people to have as their goal the imposition through its strength of working class and popular power and the people’s economy.

In relation to the developments in our region A. Papariga stated that “The position of the KKE has been confirmed that war continues to be a weapon of the bourgeois political system for an exit from the crisis in favour of capital and indeed it strongest sections.”

The GS of the CC of the KKE spoke concerning the scenarios of governmental changes and early elections. She particularly mentioned scenarios to create a “progressive government”, which the opportunist formation SYN/SYRIZA promotes and stressed that: “They are selling the notion that a government can govern in a progressive way without turning against the monopolies and abolishing them. That it can be pro-people and at the same time not come into total conflict with the EU and NATO. No government is in the position to follow a pro-people political line without radically dealing with the monopolies and the commitments in relation to the imperialist unions.”

In addition she called on the people not to fear political instability. As she said characteristically: “It should not fear anything that weakens the power of the monopolies, which stems from its own intervention. The people must be fearful when there is a stable government, a majority or coalition government which uses the people’s fear of anarchy to push forward the worst measures.”

Aleka Papariga called the “people to raise its own political subject against every form of disguise of the bourgeois political system. Its political subject is the socio-political front of the anti-monopoly anti-imperialist forces which today because of the conditions acquires an anti-capitalist direction.”

The speaker analytically referred to the productive forces and development potential of the country, which will be utilised by popular power. The proposal of the KKE, which the GS of the CC presented is detailed and has to do with the utilisation of the mineral wealth, energy resources, the potential for the development of agriculture and livestock farming, the development of industrial production, the shipping industry etc. A prerequisite is that “the concentrated means of production become the property of the people”, as well as the “central, scientifically organised, planning of the people’s economy.”

Aleka Papariga further noted that:

“Popular power will economize significant resources which are being wasted today within the framework of the bourgeois strategy for the reinforcing of the competitiveness and power of the monopolies.

We mention the following characteristic examples:

• The abolition of the financial blood-letting and robbery which capitalist ownership imposes and the multi-faceted subsidies which empty the state funds to support the monopoly groups.
• The cancellation of the public debt which the workers do not owe and which has surpassed 340 billion Euros and increased by 41 billion Euros only in 2010.
• The abolition of military spending for NATO plans (e.g. expeditions in Kosovo, Afghanistan).
• Labour productivity will increase through the use of technologies and through the participation of the people in workers’ control. The reduction of labour costs and materials will be achieved with the simultaneous increase of the results of production, having nothing to do with the pursuit of capitalist competitiveness.
• Workers’ control, the policy of reducing social and wage inequalities, will contribute to the drastic limiting of the corruption of state employees, as well as phenomena of mismanagement.
• The withdrawal of the country from the EU and every imperialist alliance and union will shape favourable conditions for the signing of mutually beneficial international relations of cooperation. Popular power is the only one which can effectively use inter-imperialist contradictions for the prosperity of society and to effectively defend the sovereign rights of the country.

The significant geopolitical position of the country, especially as regards the transportation of energy and commodities between Europe Asia and Africa, creates a significant basis for the negotiations of the popular power particularly in the current period when the inter-imperialist contradictions are sharpening.

Workers’ control, the people’s participation will be guaranteed not only by means of institutions and laws but also by practical measures such as the extension of workers’ free time so as to exercise workers’ control.

It will start from the productive units with elected recallable representatives and it will extend to every sector, to all the regions. Representatives of the workers in state productive units will participate in the elected bodies of state power. Likewise the commodity-producers who participate in the cooperatives, students, pensioners and others who do not participate in state enterprises. Even in the highest body of state power the representatives will not be permanent but recallable. The elected representatives will not have any special gains or privileges.”

The General Secretary of the CC of KKE underlined that the “desire of the people to win must become the guide of a people that can achieve anything when it wants to. Bourgeois political power and capitalism are not all-powerful.”