The Central Committee of the PCP, meeting on September 21 and 22, 2024, adopted the Theses - Draft Political Resolution of the XXII Congress of the PCP. It analysed the political situation and pointed out lines of work and action, following the success of the 48th. Avante! Festival

The Central Committee of the PCP salutes the militants of the PCP and the JCP, the many friends of the Party and of the Festival who built and organised the 48th. edition of the Avante! Festival. The Festival was an important success in its various dimensions, with a large popular participation, particularly of the youth, held in an atmosphere of joy, fraternity, confidence, tranquillity and freedom, creating good conditions for the preparation of the 49th. edition, which is scheduled for September 5,6 and 7, 2025.

The Avante! Festival was also an important display of internationalist solidarity, thanks to the presence of numerous communist parties and other progressive and revolutionary forces, with expressive actions of solidarity with the peoples in struggle, particularly the heroic Palestinian people.

I. Raise wages and pensions, fight the choices of the government and capital

1.The national situation is marked by an increasing contradiction between the difficulties of the majority of the population, with low wages and pensions, and the colossal profits of the main economic groups.

In the first six months of this year alone, the 13 companies listed on the PSI-20 amassed profits of more than 3 billion euros (17 million euros per day) and the five largest national banks made 2.6 billion euros in profits (14.4 million euros per day), more than they made in the whole of 2022. These figures contrast with the difficulties faced by the majority of workers and the population, with more than 2 million people living in poverty, and which portrays the result of a policy at the service of the economic groups with the accumulation of millionaire profits.

Raising wages is the great national emergency facing the country, previously refused by the PS government and now also by the PSD/CDS government. Wage increases that are fair, because it is the workers who create wealth, make the country work and must be fairly compensated for this; which is possible, with a fairer distribution of the wealth created, also favouring micro, small and medium-sized companies by boosting the internal market; which is urgent, given the rise of the cost of living.

The first few months since the PSD/CDS government took office confirm the deepening of the right-wing policy, in a relationship of forces at institutional level that is more favourable to the interests of big capital, with the intensification of exploitation, the attack on public services and the imposition of regression of social rights, as well as the promotion of reactionary and fascistic ideas, forces and projects.

Added to the propaganda with which the government has tried to conceal its choices, which is underway, with the convergence of IL and Chega and the active complicity of the President of the Republic, is the utilisation of real difficulties and problems as a justification for continuing and intensifying this same policy. This action is accompanied by intense ideological mystification in order, in the name of a supposed response to problems, to foster distrust in the ability of public services to respond, to transfer public resources to big capital at the expense of investment and capacitation of public services, and to promote the privatisation of the state's social functions.

A policy dictated by subordination to the interests of economic power, which exacerbates problems, undermines constitutionally enshrined rights and jeopardises national interests. A government and a policy that promote the concentration of wealth and privatisations, of which the announced resumption of the criminal process of privatising TAP - which must be stopped - is a prime example. The Inspectorate-General of Finance has now confirmed the PCP's accusation, made since 2015, that TAP was bought with the company's own money - a fact that the Parliamentary Committee of Inquiry did not fail to note, despite the opposition of PS, BE and Chega to broaden its scope so that it was not limited to the compensation paid to a former managing director. This highlights the link between privatisations and corruption and reveals the nature and objectives that privatisations have taken on, of plundering national resources, such as the scandalous handover of ANA to Vinci, which the Court of Auditors denounced at the beginning of the year, or the announced intention to transfer another 80 million euros to the current owners of Efacec after its privatisation.

A government that deliberately pursues the option of dismantling the National Health Service, continuing the action of the previous PS government, promotes the reduction of its capacity, closes obstetrics, gynaecology and paediatrics emergency services - and is preparing to concentrate them and close them for good - refuses to valorise the wages and careers of its professionals, while at the same time transferring billions of euros that should have been invested in the public service to private healthcare groups, in clear favour of the business of illness. The decisions that have now been taken to set up 20 Model C Family Healthcare Units, as well as handing over 75,000 users to the Cascais Hospital PPP, which is run by an economic group, is a strategy for the privatisation of primary healthcare that is inseparable from the role of the PS, whose words of condemnation do not wipe out its responsibility as the author of the legislation that foresees the creation of these units.

In education, the government's choices are deepening the problems existing in public schools, while at the same time deciding to increase the contractualization amounts with private schools. A school year that begins with more than 100,000 pupils without a teacher for at least one subject - confirming the limitations of measures such as the supplementary travel allowance for teachers with criteria that introduce more inequalities - and thousands more children without a place in a nursery or pre-school.

A government that, instead of increasing pensions, opts for one-off support, far below what would result from a general and significant increase in their value, or restricted to a limited number of pensioners, in a logic focused on the so-called minimum pensions on which the previous PSD/CDS government of Passos and Portas based its policy of attacking and devaluing all pensions.

A government which, in line with the interests of monopoly capital, is pursuing: a policy of worsening fiscal injustice, such as the planned reduction in the IRC corporate income tax; manoeuvres to deceive and exonerate big employers from wage increases due to workers through fiscal changes; the threat of new and negative changes to labour legislation while refusing to put an end to the expiry of collective bargaining agreements; the reference to values for the national minimum wage which not only do not correspond to the urgency of its significant increase, but also constitute an incentive for wage restraint.

The Central Committee of the PCP warns against the manoeuvre of dramatization, victimisation and pressure surrounding the State Budget for 2025, in order to pave the way for convergence between the PS and PSD in the name of political stability. A Budget that, as the PCP has already stressed, will obey the government's programme, which the PS did not oppose, its subordination to the interests of big capital and the impositions of the European Union, which have hindered the country's development. A Budget that will not include solutions to meet the problems that the people and the country require and will be, directly and indirectly, a tool at the service of the interests of capital. The PCP, in the Assembly of the Republic and elsewhere, will intervene with proposals and solutions that respond to the problems of the workers, the people and the country, determined by the clarity and sense of the options, and not just brandishing words and playing backroom games.

The promotion of artificial differences between PSD/CDS (accompanied by Chega and IL) and PS, regarding media cases and the State Budget, does not wipe out the common responsibilities that are at the root of national problems: the unfair distribution of the wealth created by maintaining low wages and pensions; the devaluation of careers and professions; the rejection of the repeal of grievous norms in labour legislation; the growing privileges, including tax privileges, for economic groups; the deterioration and even dismantling of public services, in which the attack on the NHS is particularly central; the promotion of speculation, heightening the difficulties in accessing housing; the rise in prices of essential goods and services; the insufficiency and postponement of public investment; the subordination to the impositions of the European Union.

2.The Central Committee of the (PCP) expresses its solidarity with all those affected by the brutal forest fires that have ravaged the country in recent days, calls for support for the victims and the affected regions and points out that the scale and consequences of the forest fires are not unconnected to decades of right-wing policy, aligned with the Common Agricultural Policy, which has led to the destruction of hundreds of thousands of farms with the resulting depopulation and their replacement by scrubland or eucalyptus monoculture.

This wave of fires has once again highlighted the flaws in forest planning and management, the weaknesses of the civil protection system, in both prevention and combat, with a glaring lack of human, technical, material and logistical resources - only mitigated by the irreplaceable role of the firefighters, despite the deliberate devaluation to which they have been consigned by successive governments - which, apart from doses of propaganda and reactionary rhetoric, has not been corrected.

3. Imperialism’s aggressive offensive imposes great uncertainties and dangers on Humanity, but important expressions of resistance and struggle by workers and peoples are also continuing, particularly in Cuba, Venezuela, Western Sahara and the Middle East, as well as in Europe, where signs of wear and rejection of the dominant policies and forces are being expressed, albeit with contradictions.

The Central Committee of the PCP emphasises the particular gravity of the situation in the Middle East. It strongly condemns Israel's continued aggression against the Palestinian people and its escalation of confrontation, which threatens to spread the war to the whole region, as recent events in Lebanon, Syria and Iran have shown. The PCP calls on the Portuguese government to take a clear stance condemning Israel's aggressive policy and crimes, to recognise the State of Palestine and to act in active solidarity with its people on the political, diplomatic and humanitarian levels.

In view of the prolongation and enormous dangers associated with the war in Ukraine, particularly with the recent threats of NATO member countries' participation, now openly, in the conflict, the Central Committee of the PCP reaffirms that the US, NATO and the EU must put an end to the strategy of instigating and extending the conflict, and that negotiations with the other players, including the Russian Federation, must be opened as a matter of urgency, with a view to reaching a political solution, responding to the problems of collective security and disarmament in Europe and complying with the principles of the UN Charter and the Final Act of the Helsinki Conference.

4. On the occasion of Amílcar Cabral's centenary and emphasising the relevance of his legacy and revolutionary thought, the Central Committee of the PCP salutes the liberation movements of the former Portuguese colonies, with which it maintains relations of friendship and cooperation, inseparable from its firm principled position on the colonial issue. It values the courageous demonstrations of anti-imperialist and anti-colonialist sovereignty, for democracy, social progress and peace on the African continent.

II. Respond to the most pressing problems

1. Portugal has the means, resources and strength to materialise an alternative policy capable of implementing a model of economic and social development freed from external impositions and the interests of capital, and which, as a matter of priority:

• valorises wages, with a general increase in wages and the setting of the minimum wage at 1,000 euros; increases pensions, ensuring that their purchasing power is valued;
• tackles the rights of children and parents as a structuring element, creating 100,000 new vacancies and a public and national network of free nurseries and guaranteeing access to pre-school;
• affirms the NHS as the only guarantee of access to healthcare for all, respects and values its professionals and reverses the practice of transferring billions of euros to private economic groups, and invests in the NHS;
• guarantees the necessary measures to solve the problems that have led to the exodus of thousands of teachers who could still be teaching, and implements measures to valorise the teaching profession and make it more attractive, as well as measures to improve learning;
• puts an end to the speculation on rents and the cost of home ownership, protects tenants, namely by guaranteeing that leases have an initial duration of 10 years and putting an end to the eviction bureaus, relieves housing costs by ensuring that bank instalments are reduced, putting bank profits to cover the high interest rates that have been imposed, and boosts the availability of public housing;
• resolves the more than 400,000 cases of legalisation of immigrants, invests in improving working conditions, housing and access to public services, thus combating trafficking in human beings and the mafias that promote it.

What the country's situation demands is that we break with decades of right-wing policies and pave the way for a patriotic, left-wing policy that promotes the valorisation of wages and pensions, the defence of public services, the right to healthcare, education, housing, transport, culture and sport, public control of strategic sectors, the development of national production, support for small and medium-sized entrepreneurs and farmers, a guarantee of fiscal justice, the promotion of science, the protection of the environment, the defence of national sovereignty, the diversification of foreign relations, peace and cooperation between peoples.

A path that implies strengthening the PCP, an indispensable condition in the fight against right-wing policies, to demand solutions to problems, to respond to the aspirations of the workers and the people, to affirm the patriotic and left-wing alternative that the country needs.

III. Development of the struggle

The Central Committee of the PCP welcomes and values the struggles that have taken place since its last meeting, in particular those of the workers. A broad movement of strikes, stoppages, demonstrations and concentrations involving workers from various sectors of industry, transport, call centres, commerce and services, central and local Public Administration, public and private sector nurses and NHS doctors.

It also values the struggles of farmers, particularly the Douro winegrowers, as well as the various protest actions by health users.

The Central Committee of the PCP calls for participation in the actions of struggle already scheduled by the unitary trade union movement, including the nurses’ and doctors’ strikes on September 24 and 25, the strike and national demonstration by non-teaching workers on October 4, the teachers' demonstration on October 5, as well as the National Action of Mobilisation, Demand and Struggle, from October 7 to November 8, which will culminate in a national demonstration on November 9 in Lisbon and Porto, decided by the CGTP-IN.

It also calls for participation in the various actions already scheduled, namely for the right to housing, planned for various parts of the country on September 28, and for an increase in pensions, organised by MURPI for October 17 in Lisbon.

Reiterating its support for the Palestinian people and their struggle for the implementation of their national rights in accordance with international law, the Central Committee of the PCP calls for participation in the National Day of Solidarity with Palestine and for Peace in the Middle East, called by various unitary organisations and taking place between October 2 and 12 in various cities across the country.

IV. Strengthen the Party's organisation and intervention. Prepare the XXII Congress

The Central Committee of the PCP values and salutes the intervention of the organisations and militants of the Party and the JCP in responding to the economic and social problems and in holding the Avante! Festival.

The Central Committee of the PCP highlights the series of initiatives to continue the commemorations of the 50th. anniversary of the April Revolution and those linked to the commemorations of the V Centenary of the birth of Luís de Camões and the Centenaries of Amílcar Cabral and Carlos Paredes, as well as the development of action in defence of peace and solidarity with the peoples, in particular the Palestinian people.

The current situation points to the need to intensify the action to strengthen the Party and its initiative in responding to the country's concrete problems, which must be articulated with the preparations for the XXII Congress, which will take place on December13, 14 and 15 in Almada, under the slogan “Force of April. Taking the initiative, with the workers and the people. Democracy and Socialism”. Scheduling the debate meetings and elective assemblies in good time, with a view to ensuring the largest participation of Party members; taking advantage of this contact to increase participation, militancy and attribute responsibilities; reflecting and taking measures on essential aspects of Party building that can be dealt with within the scope of the contents of the Theses - Draft Political Resolution, which is now being put to the party collective for discussion, are, among other things, features that must be borne in mind.  

In the context of strengthening the Party, we highlight the need to intensify attributing responsibilities to cadres, to adopt measures to strengthen organisation and intervention in companies and workplaces and to promote the recruitment of new militants.

In an integrated manner with the preparations for the Congress, the Central Committee of the PCP points to the need to continue adopting measures to respond to concrete problems, boosting the struggle to resolve them, strengthening links with the workers and population, and points to this attitude with confidence and boldness as a decisive element of the Party's action.

In this sense, the Central Committee of the PCP stresses the importance of the national action Increase wages and pensions. For a better life! which will take the form of a wide-ranging action to contact the workers and populations, leading them to take a stand in favour of higher wages and pensions, in defence of public services, the right to healthcare, housing and education, free nurseries and pre-school for all children in a public network, sovereignty and development. This is an action that will take on a wide variety of forms and requires the planning of contact actions and the collection of subscriptions in support of these important measures to improve living conditions.

The Central Committee of the PCP also stresses the importance of stepping up the Local Government initiative and action in defence of the populations, with the aim of affirming throughout the country the Local Government project of the PCP and the CDU, based on the values of work, honesty and competence, as part of the preparations for the 2025Local Government elections.

The Central Committee of the Party stresses the importance of affirming the CDU, its project and its intervention. Strengthening the CDU, accounting for the work it has done, broadening its unitary expression, mobilising thousands of citizens with no party affiliation who, although they don't belong to the PCP or the PEV, support the Coalition's political project, is fundamental for solving local problems, but also for giving voice to the struggle of the workers and the people.

★★★

Facing a demanding situation, boosting political intervention and the struggle of the workers and the popular masses, strengthening the Party, affirming its ideal and project, the Portuguese Communist Party, with its courage as always, will be able to respond, in whatever circumstances, to the construction of the patriotic and left-wing alternative, of advanced democracy with the values of April in the future of Portugal, to the struggle for socialism and communism.