Greece: 'Our struggle resumes', SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras' election night speech
Speech by SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras on June 17, 2012.
For more discussion and analysis on the political crisis in Greece, click HERE.
Ecosocialism 2025
Speech by SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras on June 17, 2012.
For more discussion and analysis on the political crisis in Greece, click HERE.
Greek rage to force bailout changes: Tsipras
By Michael Stott and Dina Kyriakidou
ATHENS (Reuters) - Though it didn't win last weekend's election, Greece's fast-rising radical leftist leader says his party has won the argument against the austerity measures keeping Greece in the eurozone and will inevitably come to power.
"What Syriza has been saying all along is that the bailout plan is not viable and cannot go on," party chief Alexis Tsipras told Reuters in his first interview since last Sunday's parliamentary election. "Now they all recognize this."
Indeed, the conservative New Democracy party won the most seats in the new parliament on a promise to push through spending cuts imposed by European authorities. But after the vote, party chief Antonis Samaras said the eurozone's memorandum of understanding with Greece over its 130-billion-euro bailout should be modified.
Tsipras, a charismatic 37-year-old former student communist, predicted that the newly elected Greek government would fail because it was based on "spent political forces", paving the way for Syriza to assume power.
New Democracy and the centre-left PASOK party have taken turns ruling Greece since the country's military dictatorship ended in 1974 and many citizens blame them for its current plight.
Syriza won 27 percent of the vote in Sunday's election, up from 17 percent at a previous inconclusive election in May. That made it the second largest party behind New Democracy and delighted its supporters, who partied late into the night outside Athens University after results came in.
Relaxed and confident in his Athens headquarters, where the waiting room sports a portrait of revolutionary icon Che Guevara, Tsipras said: "Nobody else but us can carry out the deep reforms the country needs because we are not corrupt or worn out. Sooner or later, we will get this opportunity."
ALTERNATIVE POLITICAL MOVEMENT
Tsipras said Syriza's rapid rise showed how Greeks were channeling their rage at the austerity measures - which have sent the economy into a deep recession and pushed unemployment close to 23 percent - into an alternative political movement.
Given public anger at Greece's long-established parties, he added, "if Syriza didn't exist today the alternative would be extremes, chaos and Golden Dawn," a neo-Nazi party.
"We will prepare a lot better to exercise a much more combative and responsible opposition," he pledged. "And, obviously, to organize to be able to claim government when the opportunity arises."
Syriza's key demands are for wealthy tax evaders to be taxed, and for what Tsipras calls "huge and unbelievable waste in the public sector" to be stamped out, by making it function more effectively.
"We have talked about the need to stop people collecting salaries for doing nothing, about reducing the number of ministers' advisers and government officials by half, and curtailing MPs and ministers' wages and privileges," he said.
Tsipras said he opposed the terms of the bailout because it didn't help ordinary Greeks who had suffered most from austerity and recession. "It is a bailout for banks and a sinking of the needs of the real economy and society," he said.
Greek politicians have turned their fire on Germany for insisting on deep spending cuts despite the country's deep recession and Tsipras had a special message for Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Merkel "must not insist on the mistake of austerity", he said. "Europe cannot march on united if it continues to support these barbaric measures."
Citing the spreading of the eurozone crisis to other countries as proof that Greece was not the root cause, Tsipras added: "All those people who said the problem was the lazy Greeks are now seeing the problems in Spain and Italy too. Something else is wrong."
RAGE AS A WEAPON TO NEGOTIATE
Although Germany has resisted anything more than minor changes to the Greek bailout, a senior Eurozone official privately agreed with Athens. "Anybody who would say that we need not, and cannot renegotiate the (memorandum) is delusional," the official, who declined to be named, told Reuters in Brussels.
Greece's near-bankrupt government will run out of money next month unless it receives a fresh infusion of cash from international lenders. That will depend on the findings of a team of monitors who are due in Athens to check progress on the austerity program.
Asked about strategy after Sunday's election, Tsipras signaled that Syriza would not call its supporters onto the streets to protest against the austerity measures. The bloc of 12 leftist groupings would instead focus its energy on creating "a shield of protection for those on the margins".
"Solidarity and resistance are both important, but right now solidarity is the most important," he said. "Our role is to be inside and outside parliament, applauding anything positive and condemning all that is negative and proposing alternatives."
Clearly relishing his new-found international fame and his fast-rising popularity at home, Tsipras suggested his greatest moment was yet to come however.
"Greece needs courageous and decisive leaders who can use the rage of our people...as a weapon to negotiate for the benefit of the country", he said.
(Editing By Paul Ingrassia and Andrew Osborn)
KKE assessment of election results
CP of Greece, Decision of the CC of the KKE: First Assessment of the election result of 17th June 2012 [En., Ru., Ar.]
Tuesday, 19 June 2012 00:00 Communist Party of Greece
http://inter.kke.gr , mailto: cpg@int.kke.gr
The CC of the KKE met on 18th June 2012 and discussed the first assessment of the results of the elections on the 17th of June as well as the developments after the elections. The position of the CC will be discussed in the Party Base Organisations, the organizations of KNE, in meetings with supporters, friends and people who work alongside the party in order to gather opinions and suggestions. The CC will conclude its assessment after gathering the views, the suggestions, the observations regarding both elections (May-June) which will also set the immediate tasks of the party.
A. Basic assessments regarding the election result
The CC summarizes its first assessment and tables it for discussion:
The election result is negative for the people, which has suffered significant blows by the consequences of the economic capitalist crisis in Greece. The following negative elements are visible:
The significant losses of the KKE which do not reflect the impact of its positions and its activity, in light of the negative developments which hadbeen predicted. It took place under the pressure of the current of illusions and the rationale of the alleged lesser evil, the painless and easy paththrough which it is allegedly possible to form a government to manage the crisis on the terrain of the monopolies’ power and the assimilation in the EU, which will manage to stop the deterioration of the position of the people. At the same time, there was the impact of the atmosphere of fear and intimidation concerning the expulsion of Greece from the Eurozone. It occurred in conditions of a systematic and underhand offensive by the ideological-political mechanisms of the system, even through the systematic use of the internet. The main goal was the weakening of the KKE in order to prevent the rise of the labour movement in conditions when the position of the people is deteriorating.
The CC salutes the thousands of working people who withstood the pressure and the blackmail, voted once again for the KKE and responded to thecall of the party to prevent the attempt to weaken it. It appreciates and salutes the heroic activity of the members of the party and KNE during this difficult electoral battle.
The increase of ND’s votes which enabled it to become the first party and have the basis to form a coalition government. The policy of ND is anti-labour, anti-people. ND will seek to place the burden of the sharpening of the crisis on to the people ensuring the recovery of capital’s profitability. ND has given to the bourgeoisie and the EU all the necessary assurances concerning its “EU one way-street strategy”. The truth is that the worst is yet to come and not the opposite, as Mr. Samaras claimed. The apparent coalition government will follow the line of the “EU one way-street”, the line of the bourgeois management of the crisis.
The increase of SYRIZA in the second electoral battle despite the fact that its management logic was exposed by its governmental programme. In this programme it omitted any slogans with a radical phraseology concerning the abolition of the Memorandum and the loan agreement, the abolition of privatisations etc which it had put forward in its programme for the elections on May 6th. Thus it became a programme ofbourgeois management. It demonstrated that it has a flagrantly accommodating stance in relation to the foreign powers.
In conditions of an intense manipulation of the people it was supported by popular forces that wanted a negotiation of the memorandum, without any confrontation with the EU and the Eurozone.
The consolidation of the electoral strength of the fascist “Golden Dawn”, its transformation into a parliamentary party. In conditions of crisis the “Golden Dawn” constitutes a significant weapon of the bourgeois political system in order to break the workers’ and people’s movement, to facilitate the dangerous equation of fascism with communism as a state ideology and consequently a state practice against the KKE.
The conclusion is that the election result as a whole reflects the tendency of the containment of the class oriented radicalism that developed during the period of crisis, under the pressure of the current of the rising petty-bourgeois radicalism, guided by the bourgeois ideology and propaganda. It is obvious that the struggles which developed did not manage to deepen and consolidate radicalism as they did not take on such a mass character andthey did not achieve the organisation and the political orientation that the current conditions require. In the final analysis, any positive tendency that developed was influenced by the narrow anti-memorandum content, by the lowering of the expectations in conditions of the expansion of poverty and mass unemployment.
The election result contributes to the promotion and the reinforcement of the plans of the bourgeois class of the country concerning the substitutionof the system of the two party rotation by a new bipolar system, the centre-right with ND as its core and the centre left with SYRIZA as its core,which absorbed a large part of the organised cadres of PASOK. The plans for the reorganisation of social democracy are being facilitated. Social democracy has proved to be useful for the bourgeois class regarding the erosion of the radical consciousness in favour of the “EU one way- street”,and in order to attack and control the labour movement.
The CC calls on those people who this time preferred to vote for other parties instead of the KKE and especially for SYRIZA to think hard on this evenif it is in retrospect. It calls on the working people in general to think in a calm way about a series of events that took place from the 6th of May until 17th June, which attributed special and unprecedented elements to this electoral battle, which we have not experienced in the post-dictatorship period. Specifically:
a. the unprecedented direct, provocative, blatant intervention of the EU Commission in the electoral campaign through its leading figures from Germany, France, Italy, the IMF, the USA, the international media. All of them express the opposing interests of monopoly groups, therefore, they sought the intimidation of the Greek people in order for it to abandon even the demand for the abolition of the Memorandum and the loan agreementwhich was at the centre of the May 6 electoral campaign.
Although the people’s movement in Greece has significantly risen over recent years and its demonstrations have had an impact across Europe, it did not have the necessary orientation and the required mass character – organisational capability so as to challenge the power of capital. Although the size of Greece is very small within the framework of the EU, its deep assimilation into the Eurozone, the deep and prolonged crisis combined with the recession in the Eurozone made the intervention of the international alliances within and outside of the EU imperative in order to impede any tendency for the radicalisation of the movement n Greece as well as its international impact.
In this framework there has been a systematic effort to form a bipolar system based on ND and SYRIZA. At the same time the Greek elections in June were used as an experiment and a tool serving the competition between Germany, France, Spain, Italy in the light of a new sharpening of the crisis. The discussion about amendments to the EU austerity formula did not begin with the Greek elections on 6th May. It had started before in the light of the inter-capitalist contradictions within the EU with the participation of the USA and President Obama in particular.
The Greek elections and the developments were utilised as a lever for the contradictions between them given the EU Summit on 28-29 June, the G7 Summit and the G20 Summit on 18-19 June. The rhetoric of SYRIZA against Merkel was utilised by a section of Germany’s competitors as well as by the US, against the other section that supported that the abolition of the Memorandum would lead Greece outside the Eurozone and possibly cause its dissolution.
b. The statement of SEV (The Hellenic Federation of Enterprises) concerning the necessity for the formation of a coalition government with the anti-memorandum SYRIZA. The obvious support for SYRIZA from a section of the monopoly groups and outlets in the mass media, and from the state radio and TV channels.
c. The organized move to SYRIZA of a large section of PASOK cadres especially from the former state enterprises, the banks, public administration as well as other central cadres from PASOK’s apparatus, who took an active part in organizing its electoral struggle and the organized transfer of a large part of PASOK’s electoral base to SYRIZA.
d. The unanimous position of all the parties of the “EU one-way street” that a positive wind of change is blowing in Europe and that the amendment of the Memorandum and even of the Loan Agreement could bring relief and a positive prospect for the Greek people and more generally, despite the fact that alternative reactionary outcomes are being planned for so that the reactionary reforms can proceed in its member-states in a unified way: Strengthening of the super powers of the Commission and the sharpening of the contradictions which cause a intensification of the unevenness and centrifugal forces, and even the disintegration of the Eurozone.
The last two electoral campaigns, especially that of 17th June turned out to be an unparalleled operation for the manipulation of the voters, with blackmails, disinformation, attacks against the party because of its denial to participate in a government of bourgeois management, a manipulation which was unprecedented. The attack against the party was aimed at its strategy, at its denial to participate in a government for the bourgeoismanagement of the crisis.
It is certain that after the elections much more evidence will come to the fore concerning what went on behind the scenes regarding the competition amongst the monopolies and the utilization of SYRIZA in this.
B. BASIC ASSESSMENTS REGARDING THE WORK OF THE PARTY
The political line and predictions of the KKE, which have been borne out by the developments themselves will be a support and significant assistance for the people’s struggle. The people will have the opportunity to draw conclusions. The radical left-wing people will also have the opportunity to draw conclusions regarding how important it was for them to support the KKE at the ballot box so that it continues to struggle from a stronger position for the regroupment of the movement and to repel the new offensive.
The KKE struggled against the current of fear and fatalism, of the various threats (from the expulsion from the Eurozone to the fear regarding the lack of a government) and the illusions which were systematically fostered by SYRIZA. It explained to the people the character of the crisis and the pre-conditions for a way out in favour of the workers, the pre-conditions regarding the KKE’s participation in a government, which are connected to disengagement from the EU, the unilateral cancellation of the debt, and socialisation i.e. the government of working class-people’s power. It conducted this struggle taking into account the danger of the electoral cost.
But even the slightest retreat on the part of the party in the face of the pressure for it to participate in a government to manage the crisis would have led to the disarming and retreat-defeat of the labour movement, to the cancellation of the effort for the formation of a strong socio-political alliance,which comes into conflict with the political line of the monopolies, the imperialist unions of the EU and NATO. It would have negated every effort for the rallying of the people in the struggle for the everyday problems, which are increasingly sharpening, for the prospect of working class-people’s power.
In practice the KKE would have found itself negating the consistency and solidity of its words and deeds, as it would have been asked to carry outdamaging and mistaken retreats of a decisive character both regarding its programme and its immediate tasks for the struggle. It is of great importance that in such conditions, when a series of other communist parties are not represented in parliament or have been diffused into social-democratic and opportunist left formations in Europe, the KKE remained standing with less electoral strength in comparison to its wider political influence.
Its strategy regarding the two paths of development, regarding the necessity of the socio-political alliance and the struggle for working class-people’s power, the expansion and deepening of its ties to the working class, the poor popular strata, remains an element of its activity amongst the people so that they remain upright and are not broken by the new hazards which await them.
The large reduction in the electoral strength of the KKE in conditions of severe pressure cannot and must not be interpreted only on the basis of the existing objective reasons. Of course it was decisively influenced by the level of the development of the class struggle, which is not exclusively determined by the party, but by the more general correlation of forces.
The CC and the whole party through a substantial discussion must examine the general subjective factors which in the medium term have influenced the political influence of the party or the subjective weaknesses during the election period regardless of their impact or the extent of their impact on the results of the elections. We must not be comforted by the fact that our political line has been borne out by the developments. We must examine the level of the party’s ability according to the criterion as to how we respond to the challenges in all conditions.
The 18th congress and the decisions of the CC which followed had underlined those factors, which determine the ability of the party to meet the needs and demands of the struggle: how it operates and works in the working class and popular masses, in the movement and in its organizations, for the building of the party in the working class, in the workplaces and sectors, for the social alliance, in its work amongst the youth and women. It is also connected to issues of ideological-political work in the party and the working class and youth. The electoral battle can offer more complete conclusions, regarding new aspects which must be better examined and which had an influence to a certain extent on the elections. It is not enoughto have a correct strategy and militancy, it is necessary for us to better study how we can acquire the greatest possible competence, whichcorresponds to the level of our tasks and the rapidly unfolding developments. We must become more demanding and exacting regarding questions of political guidance, organization, practical orientation and activity in the working class and popular masses. These weaknesses may not have played a decisive role in the result of the elections, in the specific electoral conditions where it was difficult to stem the current of fear and the chiefly thecurrent of illusions, but they play a substantial role concerning the preparation, readiness, and effectiveness in the face of the new and very complex tasks we have before us.
C NEW TASKS FOR THE ACTIVITY OF THE PARTY
The KKE will fight and seek to meet with radical working class and popular forces so that the people are not burdened with and do not pay for the political bankruptcy of the government, which they are getting ready to form. Hope must not be lost, the people must acquire strength to impede the new measures to fight for concessions to achieve their own power. The working class, the poor popular strata, youth and women are at the centre of its attention.
The KKE will fight in order to tackle the wave of disappointment from the continuation of the anti-people political line. In order to prevent the prevalence fear and disappointment, against the consolidation of a reactionary political scene within the framework of parliamentary illusions, in conditions of the deepening of the capitalist economic crisis and the sharpening inter-imperialist competition.
The hope, the militant stance is a matter of personal responsibility for everyone who follows the path of radicalism, and has a leftwing political outlook. It is an issue for which the working class is responsible for.
The historical responsibility of the KKE is not to support a government for the management of the crisis at the expense of the people.
The KKE possesses valuable historical and contemporary experience, the endurance and the ability to adjust the struggle in the conditions of a sudden upsurge of the movement, and also in conditions of the retreat of the labour movement. It can combine the immediate and more general demands, to unite the militant forces around a unified political goal.
a. It will struggle together with the people and youth so that Greek territory will not be used and that there will be no Greek participation in a war against Syria and Iran, which is perhaps being prepared for after the US elections.
b. The KKE with a compact parliamentary group will table draft laws and amendments regarding the critical problems of the people. Amongst the first of these will be the abolition of the memorandum, the Loan Agreement and all the related laws which were passed by the previousParliament.
c. It will directly support the organization of the labour movement and its allies to deal with the absolutely urgent problems such as the funding of EOPYY (National Organization for the Provision of Health services), the social security funds, the functioning of the health centres and hospitals, the protection of the unemployed, of the households in debt, the relief of the popular families from the heavy indirect and direct taxation, the sharpening problems of the youth, women, elderly and disabled. In the instance of an uncontrolled bankruptcy and a new internal devaluation it will support every popular initiative, solidarity and rally which will help the people to tackle their pressing needs.
d. It will seek to rally the people regarding the EU decisions which will meet on the 28-29 of June so that the discussion concerning the superpowers of the Commission can begin.
e. The CC calls on the workers and employees, the self-employed, the poor farmers to take immediate action through the democratic electoral processes in order to drastically change the negative correlation of forces in the third and second level trade union organizations, and for millions of workers, who up to now have not participated, to take an active part in the base-level trade unions.
The CC calls on the members, friends and supporters of the party and KNE to contribute by studying and tackling the more general weaknesses andshortcomings of a subjective character, which exist regarding our activity in the movement, in the workplaces, and neighbourhoods, in the villages, and in the places of education for the regroupment of the movement. Without this regroupment of the movement and the construction of a stronger socio-political alliance the people cannot achieve anything and take matters into their own hands. So that they can face the attack, which willintensify against the party on many levels and on many fronts under the pretext of the electoral result.
Athens 18/6/2012 The CC of the KKE
ANTARSYA Central Coordinating Commitee on election result
ANTARSYA Central Coordinating Commitee :First estimates on the results of the June 17 Election
ANTARSYA
CENTRAL COORDINATING COMMITTEE
FIRST ESTIMATES ON THE RESULTS OF THE JUNE 17 ELECTION
1. The June 17 elections marked a turning point in the fierce confrontation waged within Greek society. They reflected the major conflicts and divisions that transverse Greek society, the intense social and political confrontations, the big labor and popular struggles of the past years, but also the attempts of the pro-austerity forces to regroup and reorganize after their loss of legitimacy in the May 6 elections. However, the rift opened by the popular uprising, which took an explosive form in the May 6 election, is still active.
2. New Democracy managed to take the first place, having managed to regroup around it a significant number of conservative voters. It benefited from the ideological blackmail that dominated the electoral campaign and it aligned itself fully with the most reactionary forces of the European bourgeoisie and took advantage of the scandalous intervention by A. Merkel and other representatives of leading capitalist countries in favor of it. However, its electoral success is far from being a triumph. Despite the support it took, it did not manage to pass the 30% threshold, remaining in lower results than its erstwhile historical low of 2009. Along with the continuous collapse of PASOK it is a manifestation of the deep crisis of the pro-austerity parties.
3. The success of New Democracy opened the way for the formation of a government by New Democracy, PASOK and Democratic Left. This government will also attempt to introduce even harsher measures against labor. Despite all the talk about renegotiating the loan agreement and a strategy of ‘national salvation’, it will be a pro-austerity , reactionary, authoritarian government, in full conformity to the demands of capital, the EU, the IMF, ready to impose budget cuts, lay-offs, wage cuts, and privatizations.
4. Despite the support it has from the forces of capital, the EU-IMF-ECB Troika and corporate Media and in contrast to Samara’s insistence on a ‘long-term government’, the new government will be unstable, unable to last, a government that will soon face the anger of the people and a new wave of labor struggles. It is a government even weaker than the Papandreou or the Papadimos governments. That it is why they insisted on the participation of the Democratic Left, as a ‘left’ ally, in the same way they used the far right Laos in the Papademos government. However, in contrast to the rhetoric about a ‘return to growth’, the politics dictated under the terms of the loan agreements will only lead to a default and an even more acute crisis of Greek capitalism, in light of the global economic crisis and the crisis and reactionary mutation of the Eurozone and the EU in general. It is going to be a short-term government, and it is the responsibility of the movement to make sure that it does not last long.
5. During the whole period of the May – June elections there was a massive turn to the Left, mainly towards SYRIZA, leading to the biggest electoral results for the Left since 1958. The fact that so many voters turned their back to the austerity ‘black front’, refused to surrender to the ideological blackmail from the ruling classes, and chose to vote for the Left, is a sign of hopeful possibilities. Even in an uneven way, it is the manifestation of the desire of large segments of society to get rid of austerity and the terms of the loan agreement, especially if we take into consideration that most people from working class and popular strata, from productive ages, from urban centres voted for the Left.
6. The fact that the fascist, far-right Golden Dawn kept its electoral strength is a negative development. It is the result of the far-right policies of Samaras who, in the same way as Sarkozy in France, adopted all the racist rhetoric, thus offering the necessary legitimacy to the neo-nazis. It is also the result of the policies of Venizelos that even after the violence of Golden Dawn MP Kasidiaris against MPs of the Left, insisted that for this display of violence it not Golden Dawn that is responsible but the Left! We will continue to expose the nationalist demagogy of the neo-nazis, who are servile towards the EU, the euro and NATO, but, at the same time, they instigate racist hatred against immigrants and the people in neighbor countries. Golden Dawn for us is a product of current capitalist monstrosity, of the deep economic, political and cultural crisis of modern capitalism and at the same time an integral part of the repressive mechanism against the movement. It time for the Left to condemn and fight the reactionary, systemic, pro-bosses role of Golden Dawn and to confront it with a strong antifascist movement. With unity and determination, we can win in the fight against fascism.
7. The SYRIZA leadership did not manage, during the electoral campaign, to answer the ideological terrorism about the euro and the need to avoid ‘unilateral’ actions against our creditors. By insisting on ‘left europeanism’ and making the ‘yes to the euro’ position the central tenet of its electoral campaign, it could not answer the ideological terrorism of the ruling classes. Consequently, the electoral debate shifted to a terrain that was more favorable to systemic forces. This is was expressed in the way SYRIZA’s program turned more to the direction of a ‘renegotiation’ within the limits of the Eurozone and the terms of the loan agreements, exactly the limits that the ruling classes set after the May 6 election. Consequently, this program could not offer a way for the immediate relief of the popular classes, nor could it express the desire of the people for radical change. The ‘realism’ of SYRIZA leadership led to the pledges to the euro, to presenting budget surpluses as a solution, even to praising the police! And it is obvious that such positions do not answer the militant and radical aspirations of many of SYRIZA’s voters and the demand of the people for the Left to be a force of struggle against the new government and not a force of ‘responsible opposition’ that will simply wait for the government to fall under the weight of its own contradictions. The tactics of ‘responsible opposition’ do not help the formation of a broader social and political front in order to answer the attacks by bourgeois and pro-austerity forces. Without a radical program, without organized movements and a strong labor movement, it is not possible to answer the attack and to struggle for power.
8. The great electoral loss of the Communist Party (KKE) is not a positive development for the people and the labor movement. However, it is the result of its strategy and politics. Its sectarian tactics, the hostility against other forces of the movement, the postponement of any possibility for anti-capitalist changes until the far future of ‘people’s power’, the refusal to take a clear position on the dilemmas posed to Greek society such as the euro, the defeatist insistence on the impossibility of victory, the refusal of unitary action with other forces of the Left, its hostility against major expressions of popular struggle, all these contributed to this result. Today the challenge for all the forces of the Left, including the KKE is to contribute to the necessary unitary struggles and the necessary anticapitalist program.
9. ANTARSYA suffered big electoral losses in comparison to the May 6 elections. It is a negative result in contrast to the significant rise of our vote in May. It is true that thousands of ANTARSYA voters (but also from other currents of the Left and KKE), choose to vote for SYRIZA, but this should not be read as an endorsement to a ‘responsible opposition’ tactic. We have to organize with them the new struggles to which ANTARSYA has to play an indispensable role. We would like to thank the thousands of ANTARYA militants that fought a hard and difficult electoral campaign, avoiding useless polemics against other forces of the Left, and insisting on the necessary anticapitalist program, on the necessary militant front of struggle, on the need to escalate the confrontation. ANTARSYA was the only force of the Left that insisted that the exit from the Eurozone and the EU, the annulment of the debt, nationalizations and workers’ control could be the starting points for the immediate relief of the people and for the overthrow of austerity policies. ANTARSYA supported many labor struggles. It insisted on the unity in struggle of the forces of the Left. That is why ANTARSYA is indispensable for the future of our struggles. ANTARSYA is a crucial force of the Left. We have a responsibility against the movement.
That is why it is necessary to have a self-critical discussion of this negative electoral result.
The electoral result made evident problems and deficiencies in our ability to mobilize all ANTARSYA militants.
There were also problems in our ability to connect to all these people that turned to the Left, both in political and organizational terms.
There were deficiencies in our political and ideological preparedness. On the one hand, these had to do with the anticapitalist program. We did not manage to explain why it could lead to the relief of the people, nor did we elaborate on its reference to a socialist and communist strategy. On the other hand, they had to do with the question of power and how the struggle for political power must be based on modern conception of the revolutionary strategy, in order to avoid defeat.
We need a thorough discussion of the program, political line and tactics of ANTARSYA, in an open and democratic way, insisting on the necessary political and ideological autonomy of the anticapitalist Left, as a different current within the Left. We must work on the anticapitalist program and explain how it can lead not only to the immediate relief from austerity but also to radical social change. We must work on a strategy and tactics regarding the question of governmental and political power, the necessary forms of people’s and worker’s self-organization, the revolutionary break with capitalist social relations, the necessary forms of organizing the necessary militant front of struggle. We must intervene in the debates in the Left insisting on the need for an anticapitalist strategy.
10. Ahead of us are great challenges
-To help build the necessary militant front of struggle and escalate the struggle for a movement that will fight the new attacks and overthrow the government; to escalate the forms of struggle, instead of the ‘responsible opposition’ tactics; to insist on the necessary political demands of the movement, demanding the complete repeal of the laws associate with the austerity policies, the unilateral refusal of the loan agreements, the break with the euro and the debt, the need for immediate measures for the relief of workers.
- To take the initiative for an immediate militant response to urgent matters such as collective contracts, privatizations, mass lay-offs, tax-hikes, the University Law; to organize a strike and mass demonstration, once the government is in office; to insist on the need for the coordination of the trade unions in rupture with the trade union bureaucracy.
- To organize the people as a necessary condition for its survival and also for the reversal of austerity, through a new class-oriented regrouping of the trade union movement, through popular assemblies in neighborhoods and workplaces in order to organize the struggle and to discuss the political strategy of the movement, with various forms of solidarity, with the organization of resistance and self-defense against the ‘black front’.
- With unity and determination, we must fight against the neo-nazis. We need mass action in workplaces, in schools, in neighborhoods, to fight the social roots of the problem, to expose the reactionary role of the neo-nazis, to call for unitary antifascist action of the Left, to fight racism through the class unity of workers, Greeks and immigrants, with unitary democratic antifascist committees and initiatives.
- To take the initiative for the regrouping of all the forces that have an anticapitalist and anti-EU position, that insist on the break with the debt, the euro and the loan agreements, beginning with those currents and comrades that supported ANTARSYA in these elections, but also opening the discussion to all those that share these aspirations.
-To have a more profound and democratic discussion inside ANTARSYA, opening up the discussion on all levels, at local assemblies, at the National Coordinating Committee.
Greece: 'Our struggle resumes', SYRIZA leader Alexis Tsipras'
KKE: the election result was due the bourgeoisie wanting to replace one bi-polar system with another one.
A cunning plan by the bourgeoisie- but why exactly?
The PASOK cadres who weren't directed by the bourgeoisie to desert to SYRIZA can still be part of a Coalition government.
Maybe it's all a cunning plan by PASOK to control BOTH the government AND the opposition at the same time?
Brilliant!
Or maybe the leadership of the KKE is bi-polar?
Antarsya: 20,000 odd votes in the June elections.
Still avoiding the question of a United Front with SYRIZA, now the mass party of the Greek Working class.
Great Electoral Loss???
ANTARSYA says: "The great electoral loss of the KKE was not a positive development for the people and the labour movement."
Are these people crazy, or is their secterianism a result of, as Tariq Ali notes, coming under the influence of the KKE's own secterian politics?
The fact that the working class base of the KKE began breaking electorally with these Stalinist secterians, who spent more time attacking SYRIZA than the class enemy, is one of the major positives of the election. 4.5% for these Stalinists is 4.5% too much!!
If ANTARSYA had an iota of political savvy, they would call for a Front of the Left, including SYRIZA, ANTARSYA, the independent revolutionary left, and the KKE, and raise the slogan "for a front of the left to prepare the way for a workers' government". This would give them the opportunity to present the former as well as present KKE supporters a roadmap for taking power, and further discredit the abstentionist Papariga leadership. What are they thinking of????
Let's see how he goes...
Let's see how Tsipras is going to manage now... I wish he is good enough to put pressure on Nea Dimokratia and Pasok.