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The Communist Party of Greece (KKE, on the Greek abbreviation) left the last turbulent parliament election, on June 2012, gaining 12 seats and with the purpose of attacking the “European Union’s imperialism” and of rejecting the left coalition Syriza, which grew 300% and now has the second largest workbench in the house.
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Fighting for anti-austerity politics, the party mobilizes its union section, PAME (All-Workers Militant Front), which bring tens of thousands of people to the streets of Athens. They yell that the people need to be united and they support disobedience towards the Troika (formed by the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund).
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Interviewed by Opera Mundi, Giorgos Marinos, a leader of KKE, says that the measures imposed by the Troika are “becoming more and more dangerous” and says he’s sorry for the rise of the extreme-right party Golden Dawn, which nowadays has 18 seats in the Parliament. “The populism of this fascist gang, that feeds racism and explores misery, is gaining ground in several ways”, he said.
To Marinos, Syriza might benefit from occasional new elections and take office, but it won´t give the right answer to the crisis. “It [the party] is mocking the people, breeding false expectations to take office and to make what the other social-democrat parties made when they won the popular vote: they proved to be fanatic guardians of capital interests”, he said.
OM: How do you analyze a recent research that says only 11% of the Greeks believe in the country’s democracy? Who is to blame?
Giorgos Marinos: We can’t take every study seriously. Many serve specific political interests. For all practical purposes, thousands of female and male workers, popular forces and the youth are fighting every day for their rights, for democratic rights and the freedom of Association, especially in their workplaces, where the employees are intimidated.
Of course there is indignation. The bourgeois parties’ responsibility is huge. Those parties that defend the politics of the European Union. This anti-people politics causes indignation even among the popular forces that voted for the bourgeois parties and now regret it.
Our party openly says to the population that indignation is not enough, and it can be vulnerable to populism and to dangerous slogans that come from fascist and extreme-right forces such as the Golden Dawn, that uses theses slogans in a demagogic way and play with people’s anxieties.
OM: How do you evaluate the government of premier Antonis Samaras?
GM: The government formed by the three parties [the center-right New Democracy, and the center-left PASOK and the Democratic Left] and the prime-minister Samaras [New Democracy] defend the capital’s interests, defend NATO and the European Union. That’s how tough measures against the people can rise, and become more and more dangerous.
OM: Does KKE believe that the government’s coalition will succeed in implementing the laws and cuts proposed by the Troika? Will the Greeks obey?
GM: KKE fights to stop these anti-people measures before they are implemented. Our party fights against this line of politics and the bourgeois party. As a consequence, to predict the application of these measures would create the stage for a great confrontation. The result will be evaluated by the level of the class conflict, we’ll see if the workforce fight is lined up with the rupture of the great capital or the end of the anti-people line of politics.
OM: Do you consider it possible that there could be new parliament elections anytime soon?
GM: The anti-people politics are provoking a series of intense popular protests, the difficulties to administrate the capitalist crisis are being multiplied and the imperialist contradictions are more and more present in the Eurozone and in the European Union. In these conditions, new elections can be called and our party will be ready if that happens.
OM: A study shows that, in case there are new elections, the Golden Dawn party [extreme-right] would be the third largest on the Parliament [only losing to New Democracy, center-right, and to Syriza, a left coalition]. How do you evaluate this growth?
GM: KKE does not underestimate this phenomenon. It’s obvious that there is a profound crisis and a rise in poverty, and the populism of this fascist gang, that feeds racism and explores misery, is gaining ground in several ways.
We’re sure that the fascist alignments are the creation of a capitalist exploration system and its mechanisms and are supported by a bourgeois State, which is connected with the army and the security forces.
Our party is vastly experienced and fights against this fascist gang, which praises Hitler and the Greek dictators of 1967-1974. KKE systematically informs the population about it and tries to encourage the isolation of the Golden Dawn, so that the workers’ movement can deal with it in a massive and determined way.
The organized workers’ movement and the communist leadership can ruin the plans of the system forces, which feed and support this fascist monstrosity for it to attack the popular forces.
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OM: Lots of immigrants are taking part in the PAME’s [All-Workers Militant Front, union connected to KKE] demonstrations. Does KKE have a strategy to attract immigrants to the party?
GM: Historically, KKE faces immigrant’s issues using only one principle: treating them as a part of the working class, fighting for them to have full rights and insisting that they organize unions, that they fight side by side with the Greek workers. In spite of all the difficulties, there are already a large number of immigrants close to PAME and to other unions and some of them have been elected as leaders.
At the same time, militant immigrants who are experienced in class conflict are approaching KKE, associating to the party, fighting with us to strengthen our ties, to make them stronger.
OM: Does the party recognize the country’s financial debt?
GM: The debt wasn´t created by the people, who have no responsibility for it. The plutocracy created the debt, as well as the line of politics of the bourgeois parties, which served their own interests. The debt was created by a politics that served to finance the great capital, made of tax exemptions for large businesses, great volumes of money spared for the needs of NATO. It was also a consequence of Greece’s entrance in the European Union at the expense of the basic industrial sectors and the reduction of the agricultural production.
Our party encourages the population to not accept making whatever sacrifices for the crisis, the debt or the plutocracy and to take a leadership role in the development of the class conflict with demands, aiming at goals that answer the needs of the working class and their families, stressing that the main goal is the population’s counterattack to knock down the monopolies’ power.
It’s obvious that there’s no administration pro-people of the capitalist crisis and the exploration system that sustains it. The crisis is a crisis of the capitalist mode of production, the crisis of a capital that was accumulated in excess and that is not being used because it’s not as profitable as the capitalists would like it to be. That means the bourgeois positions and the positions of those who are opportunist defenders of the system, that say that the crisis is to blame on neoliberalism and that it is a debt crisis, have no clue of reality. These positions try to exempt capitalism and to lock the population up in and anti-people administration formula, that doesn’t hurt the system.
That’s precisely what Syriza is doing in Greece. It’s presenting itself with a left speech, but in practice it’s a force that operates inside the system’s pattern. Because the party supports the European Union’s imperialism and it’s compromised with is anti-people strategy, it supports the monopolies power and the capitalist possession of the means of production.
As a consequence, it essentially mocks the people, cultivating false expectations to take office and make the same thing that the other social-democratic parties did when they gained the popular vote: they proved to be fanatic guardians of the capital’s interests on the exploring system.
We stress this because we are sure that Syriza hides and twists the truth, especially when it speaks with foreign workers. It hides that it is supported by the great monopoly groups of Greece, that it defends Barack Obama’s line of politics in his competition against Germany, that it has secret meetings with Israel’s president Shimon Peres, and that as a left wing administration, will become a capitalism defendant with no excuses.
OM: What does KKE suggest to solve the crisis?
GM: KKE’s political proposal is based on the solid organization of the working class and on its alliance with the most oppressed stratums of the population and it foresees the end of the capital’s power, the downfall of capitalism. That means that the party predicts the power of the working class, the socialization of the means of production — mineral resources, energy, telecommunications, transports etc. — the creation of production cooperatives for small farmers, a central planning for the economy’s development and the social control of the workers, so that they have an active voice.
This proposal predicts a confrontation and a rupture with both NATO and the European Union, the unilateral cancelation of the debt and the development of the relations with States that produce mutual benefits.
The proposal requires a conflict with the great interests, demands sacrifices, but it’s an answer that comes from the working class’ interests, from the depleted farmers’ interests, from the poorest stratums of the populations and from the popular youth. It’s KKE’s answer from the popular forces’ point of view, that face an unemployment boom — there are more than 1.5 million unemployed people in Greece — poverty and the inability to solve their basic problems.
OM: What is the priority for 2013?
GM: It is to organize the people’s fight against the anti-people measures, against the ND-PASOK-Left Democratic government line of politics, against the European Union and the capital forces. We will promote a mass movement that is assertive about the right to work, that will protect the unemployed, fight for salaries, retirement pensions, public health and education.