For a United Front to defeat the offensive of the employer, the government and the right!
Volkswagen metallurgical point the way of the fight!
22 Jan 2015
Statement of the fight against pro-imperialist coup in Brazilby the Joint Committee (LC – CL – RPR)
The Joint
Committee was formed by the Communist League, Lenin Collective, Popular
Revolutionary Resistance (Brazil) calling for an anti-imperialist united front
(AIUF) against the threat of a right coup in Brazil
2015 began
with the working class coming under intense attacks from the government and
employers, with threats of massive layoffs of in VW, Ford, Mercedes, with
threat to unemployment insurance, sick pay, pensions, wage allowances, etc;. We
also say outsourcing of medical skills, higher taxes, lack of mains waters and
curs electricity supply in the working class neighbourhoods.
In its
fight against the employer offensive, which aimed to dismiss 800 workers,
Metallurgical VW bypassed the trade union bureaucracy policy and put thousands
of protesters to halt the Anchieta Plant [1], along with the workers of Ford
and Mercedes. The example of this historic and symbolic victory of a major
portion of the Brazilian working class shows that the left must resume more
effective fighting methods and adopt combative attitude towards Rousseff ’s
austerity policies. Although, conducted by the trade union bureaucracy, the
victory won in this battle has only been partial because it accepted the
imposition of the PDVs (voluntary resignations plan) and the resignation of
subcontracted workers.
The right
was strengthened in 2014, a year marked by attempts of coups and electoral
mobilization of the most reactionary sections of the middle class who are
xenophobic, racist, anti-popular and angry in a way not seen since the Family
March in 1964. [2]
Rousseff
and the PT won supported by a popular base very afraid to see their rights
suspended for a possible election victory of the traditional right.
CAPITULATION
OF DILMA TO PRESSURES
FROM RIGHT
ONLY PAVE THE WAY RIGHT
But under
pressure from the right Dilma adopts the program defeated at the polls and believes
that by giving in to the demands of finance capital and the bourgeoisie, she
will disarm the forces that threaten a coup.
The tactic
is to attack the rights won by working class and govern for four more years
without a legal parliamentary coup armed by the private banks with the support
of the mainstream media.
The right
exploits the fragility of the new PT government, and has been exposing the myth
of capitalist government without corruption and the farce that the economic
crisis would only be a “small wave”. While Rousseff has exhausted her own
political capital, the right seeks to acquire popular support away from openly
coupists groups because their tactic is via impeachment legitimized by street
demonstrations amplified by the mainstream media, as recently occurred in
Paraguay and Ukraine.
Even
opponents of the PT policies, several leftist organizations mistakenly believe
that Dilma’s capitulation will dissipate the risks of an attack and that,
therefore, it is not necessary to fight the right with a strong united
anti-coup front. This mistake can be very costly to the left in general.
THE COUP
AND THE NEW COLD WAR
The tactic
of the internalisation of the policy of the right only serves to pave the way
for reaction and has no effect against the coup. How come? Because even the
most neoliberal economic policy to be applied by Dilma not solve the current
problem in the US, located by the new cold war world, where imperialism tries
to contain the growing economic influence of the political and military bloc of
countries led by Russia and China.
The
threatening coup in Brazil is mainly a product of this new international
situation arising from the need of the US to regain its Latin American
backyard. This they seek to do by deposing the PT government (because they are
collaborators with their international BRICS partners who advocate of
de-dollarization of commercial transactions) and replacing it by a typical
right-wing pro-imperialist government.
NO POLITICS
COOPTION!
FOR A
UNITED FRONT AGAINST THE RIGHT
AND DILMA’S
AUSTERITY TAX
Knowing the
right-wing dynamic in both the streets and in the highest authorities of the
state (Congress, Supreme Court, federal police and prosecutors), Lula agitates
the MTST (the homeless workers' movement) to convene a kind of “popular front
of masses” to try to compete with the right wing on the streets and to shield
Dilma a little and prepare his own candidacy for 2018.
The PT must
co-opt the social movements to:
1) Control
the impact of the street strikes and bring the movements under the influence of
the government;
2)
demonstrate to the big banks and private corporations they still need the PT to
govern without a social crisis.
We, the
Joint Committee call on the workers organized in the social movements, groups,
collectives and parties of left in this meeting to go out from here with united
front against anti-proletarian policy and Dilma in combat right and extreme
right organizations.
UNITED
FRONT YES!
POPULAR
FRONT NO!
We have no
illusion in the new Popular Front which demobilises the social movements to
ensure the effectively management of capitalism.
We believe
that this united front must embark on a unified national programme of strikes
and unrest in the streets, playing them inch by inch against the right-wing and
the bosses. The united front against the right must coordinate the struggles
against mass layoffs in the industry categories and other sectors of essential
services (rail, subway, bus), with popular movements struggling for housing
(FIST, MTST, MNLN).
At the same
time, the United Front itself will be able to give a qualitative jump in the
organisation of the popular movements by coordinating events, and thus it will
able to repel any attempt to influence or hijacking the agenda of workers’ aims
by the onslaught of right-wing media. They use their ideological instruments
known encourage the conservative middle class and by infiltrating right-wing
elements into the left demonstrations.
Notes
[1] The
Anchieta plant in São Bernardo do Campo, less than 30 km from São Paulo. It is
the main plant outside Germany and it is also the seat of the headquarters and
the Development department of Volkswagen of Brasil.
[2] Refers
to the coup on 1964, “in the year before the coup, left-wing President João
“Jango” Goulart embarked on a program of social reform. A speech he gave in Rio
on March 13, 1964, promising dramatic changes sparked fears of a communist
takeover. On March 19, hundreds of thousands in Sao Paulo joined the
anti-reform Family March With God for Liberty, which led right-wing military
elements to believe they could depose Goulart without sparking a civil war. They
were proved right.” (Washington Post, 31 March 2014)