May Day Joint statement of communist and workers parties

We demonstrate against capitalist exploitation and imperialist wars.

For the satisfaction of the contemporary needs of the Working class and people!

For the overthrow of the capitalist system.

For working class-people’s power, socialism-communism.

Working men and women! Workers all over the world! The communist and workers parties, , which have signed this statement, address this common message on the occasion of this crucial May Day in 2012, which is of particular importance, at a time when the workers in many countries are experiencing the consequences of the capitalist crisis, the consequences of the imperialist wars and interventions and the intensification of capitalist exploitation.  

Our message is clear: The working class has the power to reverse today’s situation. Millions must shout out from every corner of the planet: No sacrifices for our exploiters. Class awakening, unity and organization everywhere. Struggle for the overthrow of the anti-people political line, for the defence of the life of the working class family from poverty and unemployment. Everyone must struggle for a life which is worthy of our work and needs.  So that the working class becomes a force for overthrow and power.
  
 Our parties are of the assessment that: In opposition to bourgeois and opportunist theories, the reality is that the working class has not only not disappeared, but is developing, growing, not only quantitatively but qualitatively, as the basic productive force, regardless of the changes which have taken place concerning its structure and composition due to the changes in the productive process caused by technological progress.

 The working class is the motor force of social development and that its historic mission is the abolition of private ownership of the means of production, the exploitation of man by man in the direction for the full eradication of the classes. There is no other social force which can fulfil this role. The reality today of the capitalist economic crisis, which has manifested itself in a synchronised way in many capitalist countries demonstrates once again that capitalism finds itself in the highest imperialist stage of its development, tortures millions of workers all across the world, gives birth to poverty and unemployment, suffers from incurable contradictions which are manifested in the cyclical crises as well as the in the wars for the expansion of the business activity of the monopolies, the division of the markets, the control of the sources of wealth. The crisis of capitalism demonstrates the historical limits of the system while the working class, which does not have the means of production at its disposal, is the “grave-digger” of the capitalist mode of production. This historic revolutionary role of the working class has its precondition that it will be organised as a class for itself. The formation and strengthening of the revolutionary party is necessary for the working class to become conscious of its mission, to shape a revolutionary strategic lead for the implacable class struggle against capital. The working class cannot have success with line of “social consensus”, and social “peace”, as is claimed by reformist and opportunist forces. The many years of negative experience demonstrate that this line led to the assimilation of the trade union movement, with social democracy and opportunist forces having the main responsibility for this. Today it is a necessity for capitalism to overturn even the most basic gains which were won in previous decades as a result of the class struggle at a national and international level. Nor can the working class struggle for the prevention of the anti-people measures, for economic and social demands and gains in conditions of capitalism can be separated with a “Chinese wall” from the struggle for the socialist-communist society. The struggle for economic, social and political demands, based on the contemporary needs of the people and working class, with the goal of rallying, concentrating and preparing working class forces for tough confrontations with the exploitative system, is not limited to the acquisition of some gains, but is linked to the goal for the overthrow of capitalist barbarity. The working class produces the wealth and must claim it in the struggle for its own power. This effort is being waged today in more unfavourable conditions due to the counterrevolution in the USSR and the other countries of Central and Eastern Europe, which led, temporarily, to the retreat of the movement, to the increase of illusions, which the bourgeois class fostered, that capitalism allegedly is the “end of history”. 20 years later the impasses of capitalism point to the necessity and timeliness of socialism.

We study the experience of socialist construction in the 20^th century, without having a negative and nihilistic stance in relation to its positive and irreplaceable contribution.  We seek to draw conclusions which will make our parties more capable, and which will also equip the working men and women all over the world with a revitalised consciousness and belief in working class power, in socialism-communism. Working men and women! Workers all over the world! We honour working class May Day, the sacrifices, the struggles of the world’s working class, sending everywhere the militant message of solidarity to our May Day demonstrations! 

We promise that we will contribute even more decisively to organize the proletariat and wage the class struggle in our countries, at a regional and international level in order for the power of the monopolies to be defeated, for capitalist barbarity to be overthrown, for socialism. We decisively raise our voices and call on all the workers, youth, women, radicals, progressive people to join forces against anti-communism and the imposition of double standards and measures against the communist parties by the EU and other imperialist alliances.

 We demonstrate everywhere against capitalist exploitation and imperialist wars and interventions at the expense of the peoples.  For the right of every people to choose their future without foreign imperialist interventions! Long live the world’s working class! Long live the revolutionary communist worldview, Marxism-Leninism, the scientifically based struggle for the overthrow of the capitalist system in every country, all over the world.  This is the way for the peoples to live peacefully, without the barbarity of capitalism, without wars.


 WORKERS OF ALL COUNTRIES, UNITE!

1. Communist Party of Azerbaijan
2. PADS, Algeria
3. Communist Party of Australia
4. Communist Party of Bangladesh
5. Brazilian Communist Party
6. Communist Party of Britain
7. New Communist Party of Britain
8. Communist Party of Bulgaria
9. Party of the Bulgarian Communists
10. Communist Party in Denmark
11. Unified Communist Party of Georgia
12. Communist Party of Greece
13. Hungarian Communist Workers Party
14. Workers’ Party of Ireland
15. Socialist Party of Latvia
16. Lebanese Communist Party
17. Socialist People's Front, Lithuania
18. Communist Party of Luxembourg
19. Communist Party of Malta
20. Communist Party of Mexico
21. New Communist Party of Netherlands
22. Communist Party of Pakistan
23. The Phillipine Communist Party -PKP-1930
24. Communist Party of Poland
25. Romanian Communist Party
26. Communist Party of Soviet Union
27. Communist Party of the Russian Federation
28. Russian Communist Workers Party - Revolutionary Party of Communists
29. New Communist Party of Yugoslavia
30. Party of Communists of Serbia
31. Communist Party of the Peoples of Spain
32. Syrian Communist Party
33. Communist Party of Turkey
34. Union of Communists of Ukraine

Solidarity with the land of Juché

Andy Brooks leads the NCP side in talks with Choe Thae Bok of the WPK

by New Worker correspondent

NEW COMMUNIST Party of Britain comrades joined millions of Koreans in Pyongyang this month to celebrate the centenary of the birth of great leader Kim Il Sung and take part in the World Congress of the Juché Idea that opened in the Democratic Korean capital on 12^th April.

NCP leader Andy Brooks, together with Peter Hendy and Theo Russell from the Central Committee, held talks with Choe Thae Bok, member of the Political Bureau and secretary of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea (WPK), and took part in other events and ceremonies throughout the week.

These included the great military parade in the heart of the capital that was addressed by Kim Jong Un, First Secretary of the WPK and supreme leader of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and a grand firework display along the Taedong river held on 15^th April, the anniversary of the birth of Kim Il Sung, the eternal president of the DPRK.

Speaking to the people at the military parade Democratic Korean leader Kim Jong Un saluted the historic contribution of Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il to the DPRK’s development and he called upon the whole nation to stick to the path blazed by his predecessors and strive to win new victories.

The World Congress of the Juché Idea was attended by the delegations and delegates from 65 countries including the NCP and a delegation of the British Association for the Study of Songun Policy led by Chair Dermot Hudson.

The discussion over the two-day congress at the People’s Palace of Culture was opened Vishwanath, the director-general of the International Institute of the Juché Idea, and Kim Yong Nam, the President of the Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly of the DPRK. This was followed by contributions from academics and progressives from all over the world on different aspects of Juché, the ideology of independence, anti-imperialism and socialism developed by Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il, which is the guiding light of the Korean communist movement.

Challenging hate and intolerance

By Andy Brooks

EVERYONE on the anti-fascist front knows about the regrettable split, late last year, between Searchlight and the Hope not Hate movement it founded in 2005 to mobilise opinion on the street against the British National Party (BNP).  The row that led to the walk-out by the editor, Nick Lowles, and some other contributors, clearly revolved around the direction as well as the day-to-day running of the veteran anti-fascist magazine.

            Apart from some minor delays Searchlight has continued to come out with its traditional coverage of the neo-Nazi scene in Britain and across the world.  But we had to wait until March for the launch of the new Hope not Hate magazine to see its take on mobilising “communities by providing a positive alternative to the politics of hate”. But is it an “alternative” to Searchlight?

            Yes, no and maybe. For a start it’s a 48-page full-colour glossy magazine with an in-your-face lay-out that reflects the style of Hope not Hate’s website and campaigning material. Unlike Searchlight the new magazine is the flag-ship of a broadly-based campaigning movement and also unlike Searchlight it will only come out every other month.

But there’s a familiar feel to Hope not Hate which is not surprising as it’s edited by Nick Lowles and some of the writing team will also be well-known to Searchlight readers.  A number of features follow well-worn tracks like the reports on the hidden backers of the BNP and the thuggish followers of the English Defence League. There’s also, as you would expect, some coverage of right-wing extremism in Europe and the rest of the world. But there is a different focus which goes far beyond the confines of anti-fascism.

            For instance, the first edition carries three articles on Muslim extremism. Likewise there’s a couple of “what makes an extremist” features, which largely reflect the views of bourgeois liberal social scientists while ignoring the class line which lies behind all the sectarian and racist movements in Britain that are only tolerated because they ultimately serve the interests of the ruling class.

            Islamic extremism gets almost as much as the coverage of the BNP,  which raises concerns that the journal is pandering to the same Islamophobia that the ruling class exploit and the fascists use to justify their racist doctrines. Now no anti-fascist would argue that these reactionary Muslim clerics are anything but reactionary. But they are bigots not fascists. We only have to look at the occupied north of Ireland, the extreme Zionist factions or the gay-hating bible-punching anti-abortionists to see that bigotry in the United Kingdom is not the exclusive property of the Muslim community.

 One reason these clerics have some support from the British Muslim community is because that minority community is under attack. The other is that the ruling class have encouraged all sorts of reactionary Muslim currents, in the past, to use Britain as a base to help subvert the people’s democratic government in Afghanistan during the Cold War and serve the imperialist interest in Algeria, Yemen and most recently, in the overthrow of the Gaddafi government in Libya and imperialism’s current efforts to destroy the Syrian Arab Republic.

Not everyone of Muslim origin in Britain is a practising Muslim and the community as a whole is not united around one banner but reflects the myriad sectarian divisions that exist within Islam as a whole. Furthermore the total number of nominal Muslims in Britain amounts to just five per cent of the entire population. Contrary to the ravings of the BNP and the EDL we are not on the brink of a Muslim takeover.

 But the fascist threat is always out there no matter how small they may be now. The fascist movements are the reserve army of the bourgeoisie and when the class struggle sharpens the gloves come off. As the Thirteenth Plenum of the Executive Committee of the Communist International correctly said in 1933, fascism in power is nothing more than the “open terrorist dictatorship of the most reactionary, most chauvinistic and most imperialist elements of finance capital”.

Hope not Hate clearly hopes to win new readers by going far beyond traditional anti-fascist lines but whether articles that would not seem out of place in any existing liberal newspaper or colour supplement are enough to build the subscription base to sustain it over the years remains to be seen.

But judge it for yourselves. Hope not Hate is available in the bookshops at £3.50 a copy or by writing to HOPE not hate, PO Box 67476, London NW3 9RF. For £5 a month you can obtain all Hope not Hate’s publications including an annual subscription to the magazine, a 10 per cent discount on all its merchandise and an invitation to an annual Hope not Hate dinner.