Letters

Pro Party

I am writing to express my support for the proposed ‘Year of the Party’ - the only fitting way to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the formation of the Communist Party of Great Britain.

I am absolutely confident that this will not become a tiresome round of ‘feel-good’, nostalgia-wallowing jamborees (we all know that complacent sentimentality was one of the curses of ‘official communism’), but a pro-active, forward thinking orientation which will hopefully draw in and inspire pro-Party elements (including myself, of course).

As part of your £3,000 monthly fighting fund, I pledge £20 per month out of my no-Jobseekers allowance.

If we turn the microscope on the ‘revolutionary left’ in Britain we uncover a less than edifying specimen. The ‘Communist’ Action Group is a sordidly dishonest, plagiaristic organisation whose central task seems to be to resurrect ‘official communism’ (albeit with a jazzed up, ‘modernist’ face) and indulge in opportunistic unity-mongering with the living dead.

Then we have the ‘Independent Communists’ (!), a Frankenstein’s monster of an organisation which seems to be a refuge for dysfunctional outcasts, whose only unifying force seems to be a near pathological hatred for the Communist Party of Great Britain.

The Trotskyoids are bitter old anti-communist hacks with a quasi-criminal history and the healthier elements among the Trotskyists (after all to a certain degree Trotskyism is a penalty for the centrist sins of ‘official communism’) are permanently held back by a fetishistic devotion to Leon Trotsky and his Infallible Programme(s).

As for Stalinoid groups like the New Communist Party (sic) or Straight Left (ie, Deviating Right), it is probably best to say nothing, otherwise your more sensitive readers might get nightmarish dreams of all-knowing, all-seeing, god-like benevolent dictators who Guide The Masses Ever Forwards.

The Blairite Labour Party (a political hack on Radio Four succinctly described Tony Blair as a man “unencumbered by trade union or leftwing baggage”) is moving so far to the right - apparently the ‘new’ clause four is ‘committed’ to “public ownership where it is justified on grounds of efficiency and equity” – that it almost makes the ex-SDP look like radical left reformists by comparison.

Given this “period ... of defeat, disintegration and decline of working class politics” (in the words of comrade Mark Fischer, Weekly Worker December 15), it is vital that all genuine communists coalesce around the CPGB and its principles. As comrade Jack Conrad says, “Now is the time for political boldness” - it could be now or never.

Eddie Ford
South London

Fascist Italy?

You certainly know what is happening in Italy, but I wanted to give you my feeling of the events: of the no-longer creeping coup d’état which the rightwing fascist government is staging in the country.

The Weekly Worker (November 17 1994) has given news of the great demonstration of workers, students and pensioners which took place in Rome on November 12 as a protest against the austerity budget which aimed to cut spending on pensions and health. Berlusconi’s answer to that demonstration was: “Nothing can change my plans. They should go to work instead of protesting.”

A further general strike was scheduled by the trade union leaders and was to be held on December 2 when Berlusconi was called to answer allegations of bribing public officers. Berlusconi’s answer, dictated by fear, was:

(a) the immediate resumption of dialogue with the trade union leaders which led to a dubious agreement about excluding pensions from the budget plan, but left the whole matter to some future undefined reform;

(b) the public declaration that he was ready at any time to be questioned by the judges;

(c) a heavy attack on the magistrates. Another cause of trouble and fear for the government were the results of the elections of mayors and local councils, because this time the vote was a disaster for Berlusconi’s party, Forza Italia.

But the government was suddenly helped by a sensational event: the Supreme Court of Justice decreed that much of the huge investigation into the bribing of the finance officers should be devolved to the Milan judiciary and the attorney’s office in Brescia. This decision - which means the investigation will have to start again from the beginning - was saluted by his accomplices; particularly by the president of the ‘culture committee’ of parliament, Vittorio Sgarbi, who has a daily programme on one of Berlusconi’s networks and uses it to vomit screams of insults (“Assassins!”) against the enquiring magistrates.

Possible future government alliances are alarming. The secretary of the ex-communist party (now the Democratic Left), Mr D’Alema, is trying to construct a centre-left alliance with the Popular Party (ex-Christian Democrats) and with the Northern League – a prospect which would obviously exclude Rifondazione Comunista and thus cancel all the residual Marxist principles (if any) on the Italian political scene.

Ironically, neither the Popular Party nor the Northern League seem to be willing to consort with a formation which in their opinion still “smells of communism”. We know from past experience that all attempts at gaining the favour of the bourgeois strata of the population have only produced disillusion in those who expected social justice, and that this kind of policy has on the one hand driven the party further and further away from its communist roots and on the other reduced the basis of consensus.

Paola Lombardi
Italy