It is now 150 years since the publication of the Communist Manifesto, the unforgettable work by Marx and Engels that gave a decisive theoretical impulse to a great movement of ideas and struggles guided by the innovating and revolutionary perspective of the overhaul of capitalism. We are here to celebrate, with legitimate pride and with a sense of responsibility, 77 years of life and struggle of our Party: the Portuguese Communist Party.

150 years after the Communist Manifesto and 77 years after the PCP’s foundation, here we are, standing and with our heads high, steady in our convictions, joined in solidarity by the communist ideals and by a great humanist project of transforming life, engaged in winning — for the working class, the workers in general and the Portuguese people, and through the action and will of the working class, the workers and the Portuguese people — new prospects of hope, change and social progress, required by the times we are living in.

Here we are to carry on, with new energy and a renewed fighting spirit, a huge heritage of experience and struggle which marks the PCP’s incomparable presence within Portuguese society throughout this century.

Here we are to confer new expression and development to an historical struggle against injustice and oppression, for human dignity and for freedom and democracy, which was generously supported by the effort and courage of generations upon generations of communists.

Here we are to give new breath to our Party’s intervention, as a Party of both struggle and project, that is, as a party steadily engaged in fostering resistance and in organising the struggle against what is wrong, as well as engaged in winning new support for its constructive proposals and for the answers it provides to face the great problems of the country.

Here we are as communists, that we are and want to keep on being, and as the Portuguese Communist Party, that is and wants to keep on being, with all that its name, its history and its future demand it be.

We salute the workers in struggle

We commemorate the 77th anniversary within a contradictory setting, of difficulties and dangers for workers and their rights, as well as for other underprivileged sectors and strata.

But, at the same time, the development of action, protest and struggle brings about new possibilities and potential. The recent agreement negotiated in the textile sector as a corollary of 15 months of the sector workers’ struggle is very meaningful and far-reaching, considering the iron-clad undertakings that have existed between textile big business and the Government since November 1996.

The gain of the 40-hour working week, with rest on Saturday and a 30-minute break, would never been achieved without the strikes, demonstrations, rallies and marches, without the dimension of other sectors’ and personalities’ solidarity, without the PCP’s solidarity and initiative.

Now the Government congratulates itself on such a result, after its responsibility and complicity in the abusive interpretation of the law. This cannot but be considered as pharisaic behaviour. But it also means that the Government was obliged to back down and to recognise the fairness of the workers’ demands. Once again it was proved that fighting is worthwhile. You will surely agree on saluting from here the textile workers for their fighting spirit and for their gains.

It is necessary to pursue the struggle for short breaks, against deregulation and flexibilisation of working hours.

It is necessary to consolidate the 40-hour week and consider the move toward working time reduction together with the defence of employment and wage dignity.

As a Party of struggle and proposals, the workers can count on the PCP. As in the textile sector, all those who fight in Cabos d’Avila, Carris and Rodoviárias, Gás de Portugal, Indelma, Ford Electrónica, Public Administration, banks (where the bankers’ arrogance is growing), in the railway sector, in ex-Renault-Sodia, in the building sector, all those trade union leaders, shop stewards, members of the works councils who marched the day before yesterday through the streets of Lisbon, all of them can count on the fact that the Portuguese Communist Party is and will be the bearer of workers’ aspirations, interests and rights, that it fights and will fight for them. Together with their trust, the PCP has proposals for social progress, for the right to a job, for dignified working hours and wages, for effective employment, for the fight against unemployment and the lack of responsibility of the State towards Education, Health and Social Security.

And in saluting and supporting all those who are fighting, we also want to salute in a very fraternal way the CGTP-IN, the Portuguese workers’ great trade union confederation. We also want, on the eve of the 8th March, to salute in a very special way the women, who not rarely have been at the head of the fight, as well as their more general and persistent struggle for equal participation (which is required at all levels) and their struggle against illegal abortion.

We want to salute the teachers’, parents’ and students’ struggle for the democratisation and improvement of education, as well as for fair laws on the management of schools and on the financing of public higher education. And in saluting the youth, we want to salute the JCP, the PCP’s youth and their committed participation in the defence of the working and student youth.

The youth can count on the PCP and on the JCP in the struggle for better education, for jobs with rights, for fair wages, for professional opportunities.

The PCP will not be idle in the defence of better pensions for the retired anda the disabled, specifically with meaningful rises for the lowest ones.

The PCP will not be idle in denouncing and fighting against the auction of public companies and also stresses the need to increase the popular opposition, particularly against the privatisation of companies providing essential public services and against the ensuing scandalous rise in prices, as was the case with Telecom and EDP [power company].

But very special attention — demanding our continuous engagement — must be paid to unemployment, to jobs without rights and to low wages.

More unemployment and casual labour mean more exclusion, more drug addiction, more insecurity for citizens, more potential conflicts, particularly among those who live in veritable ghettos in the big urban centres.

This is a worrying situation.

The struggle against unemployment and drug addiction and the accomplishment of a fairer distribution of the national income should be among the first priorities, not as propaganda, but as effective measures of a Government with a minimum of social concern.

In the front group and on Europe’s rear

Last week, the Government, in a big propaganda initiative, celebrated the fact that the country fulfils the Maastricht criteria imposed by Germany, thus ensuring its place in the “Euro”.

Firstly, it is necessary to say that practically only the countries that have excluded themselves are not joining the Euro.

Secondly, we must be aware of the fact that in order to fulfil these criteria, which are mainly financial, the so-called real economy — that is, the country’s productive apparatus, public investment and employment — was hindered. Contrary to what Prime Minister Guterres says, Minister João Cravinho has recently confirmed in an interview that the Government hindered public investment in 1997 in order to fulfil the deficit criteria.

And contrary to what the Minister of Finance says, a national currency is, in a globalised economy, one of the tools which is able to give an answer to competitiveness difficulties that may arise in our economy. In the future, the Euro’s constraints will be used when faced of external difficulties, to justify new sacrifices, dismissals, loss of rights and maintenance or decreasing of real wages.

Thirdly, I believe it doesn’t make us any happier to be in the front group for the single currency and to be at Europe’s rear in terms of wages, pensions and minimum pay.

We also believe that the country takes no pride in having the highest level of poverty in the community (29% of families are poor) and the highest imbalance in income distribution (the poorest 20% only have 6% of the national income, while the richest 20% have 46%, that is, almost 50% of the country’s income). I also think that we have to be worried at the fact that our economic growth rate is still lower than Spain’s, which means that the gap between the two peninsular countries continues to widen, as well as at the fact that the commercial deficit keeps growing, with a bigger and bigger proportion of the wealth produced leaving the country. Spain, in 1997, consolidated its position as our country’s largest supplier, having increased its exports to Portugal by 17,9%.

That is: they fire up because the country is going to enter the Euro and they hide the fact that we have a dependent, fragile economy, whose structural backwardness places us at Europe’s rear in terms of the essential development indicators.

Trumpets are sounded because the country fulfils the Maastricht criteria, and eyes are closed to the deplorable situation our agriculture, fishing and important sectors of our industrial activity are in. Concerning agriculture, the Minister has even acknowledged that Portugal is a net contributor to the CAP. However, the Government is still concealing from the Portuguese the fines we will be subjected to if we do not fulfil the budget deficit criteria (Stability Covenant); concealing the essential content of the Commission’s proposal on Agenda 2000 which would lead to cuts of about 500 thousand million escudos in the structural funds; concealing the negotiations concerning the Multilateral Agreement on Investments (MAI), which is, as someone has said, a true Declaration of Multinationals’ Universal Rights. Multinationals would have powers and rights greater than those of national governments. According to this “agreement”, a multinational might claim, for example, indemnities from the State in case social disturbances affected its profits! What an impudence! But about this too, the Government keeps a discreet silence. Transparency is only for speeches.

It is not by hiding facts, by using either statistical engineering or creative manipulations that reality is changed or the arrogance of transnational capital is fought.

The marketing campaigns the Government has become an expert in, might fool those who are not aware of the problems, but they do not change the seriousness of unemployment, temporary work, jobs without rights.

The marketing campaigns may for example state that wage and pension rises are not “eaten up” by price rises, but those are not the facts. In the same way, they can say that telephone prices are dropping when actually they are rising, but when consumers see the bills at the end of the month they will be seeing the price they are paying for the privatisation of this important company. Scandalous!

A few points of clarification on the referenda

Because of the indignation it aroused, and because it constitutes one more example of how the PS’s extremely rare agreements on the left are quickly dropped and traded for deals with the right, it is fitting to recall here the PS leadership’s shocking about-turn on the abortion issue. A mere 24 hours after voting for the law in parliament, and a mere 24 hours after the PS members of parliament had indignantly rejected the PSD’s demands for a referendum on this issue, the PS accepted to hold a referendum in exchange for a shameful deal. As a result, the law was frozen and put on hold.

In this respect, we want to restate that for our part we will continue to fight to the very end for parliament to do its duty, that is to say, for it to debate the law in detail and adopt it in final form, so that clandestine abortion can be effectively countered. And we also want to stress that in this struggle (and this is a well-known fact) we work in unison with a very strong body of opinion — which encompasses personalities from very diverse circles and with very diverse political beliefs — that is not willing to passively accept the PS’s deals and correctly attaches great value to consistency and to the honouring of undertakings.

We also want to reaffirm that, if a referendum were to be held, the PCP will fully shoulder its responsibilities in this cause, of which it has for many years been the main political backer, and that we will actively work for a “yes” victory.

We also want to make it clear that we highly value the possibility of the creation of groups of citizens to actively participate in the struggle for a YES victory in this possible referendum, and that communists are ready to work together with other democrats, within this type and form of work.

Having said this however, let there be no illusions or misunderstandings: at this same time, the PCP hereby announces that it will not forego having an autonomous voice and participation in this battle.

We consider that this participation is not merely legitimate. It is necessary and indispensable, as anyone with a minimal notion of what this referendum entails can understand. Some — to excuse the PS and PSD’s behaviour — have already begun to exhibit a certain hostility against the participation of political parties in the possible referendum on abortion. So we want to make it very clear here that there is reason for criticism and scandal to be found, not in the behaviour of a party which like the PCP will participate in this ballot with the same consistency with which it fights in society and in parliament, but in the PS’s behaviour if, as some are saying, after having voted for the law in parliament it was to not participate in the referendum campaign as a political party.

This is our outlook on the struggle, in case a referendum were to be called (right now even this is not absolutely certain). And we consider the most widely touted date (July 5) to be very inadequate since many Portuguese people, particularly from the urban areas, may already be away on vacation. What the PS and PSD want to do is “dump” the problem on the President of the Republic and wash their hands after all the wheeling and dealing and the mess they came up with, to freeze the law’s adoption once and for all!

But there is one more thing we want to add: before some people discover (too late) that after all, a referendum on abortion unleash a level of verbal violence and confrontation with a harshness, aggressiveness and intolerance such as had not been seen for a long time, we want to remind them from the outset that it was not the PCP that chose the path of the referendum.

Speaking of referenda, we also want to warn that what the PS and PSD are cooking up for the referenda on regionalization and on Europe is an insult against the Portuguese people and a slap in the face of democracy.

In effect, only parties that view themselves as owners of the regime, as bosses of democracy and as tutors of the Portuguese people’s rights, could come up with the absurd idea of holding simultaneous referenda on regionalization and Europe, and of holding the referendum on Europe with a biased question which does not contain what should really be asked of the Portuguese — about the single currency and Portugal’s subjection to the Stability Covenant — and is dishonestly worded to yield an overwhelming “yes”.

These objections are not raised out of narrow and sectarian partisan interests. We raise them out of elementary openness, honesty and democratic dignity, out of respect for Portuguese citizens. And no PS-PSD Central Bloc should dare to question, and much less condition or influence the President of the Republic’s judgement and sovereign decision-making powers.

Governing on the left

We are in effect the great party of the left, because we are the one major party on the left where there is consistency between word and deed, and which steadily raises the banners of the left and of [the] April [Revolution] which have such strong roots in the hearts of millions of Portuguese.

In effect, you cannot govern on the left by lowering the percentage working people’s incomes have in the National Income. This is what has been done in these last two years, worsening social inequality even more. You cannot govern on the left by granting tens of thousands of millions in tax breaks for financial and speculative operations; or by brazenly using the State apparatus to benefit the governing party, as was done in the last local government election; or by rejecting civilizational advances, as happened for example with the rejection of the PCP’s bills on Voluntary Interruption of Pregnancy, on the 40-hour working week, and on returning the retirement age for women back to 62.

You cannot govern on the left by taking one stand while in opposition and another when in government, as happened, for example, with their introduction of school tuition, and their hurry and obstinacy in making protest roadblocks a punishable offence.

You cannot govern on the left by privatising basic and strategic companies and by reducing the economy’s public sector to a size smaller than even in certain European countries, or by continuing to casualize labour to such an extent that today the Portuguese labour market is internationally recognised as one of the most deregulated and flexible in Europe. You cannot govern on the left with neo-liberal policies, with an attitude of shrinking State responsibilities in social affairs, and by sacrificing the unemployed, the pensioners, and thousands upon thousands of families, for the benefit of very few or for the dogmas of the Maastricht criteria.

Actually, the economic and social situation in which we live is such, and the political power structures’ subjection to economic powers is beginning to be so great, that a well-known socialist (Victor Constâncio, in “Visão” of 1997-12-27) did not hesitate to say that “Portugal is living its most liberal hour in all of its history”.

We could go on and on with the examples and questions. We could also recall that shameful act of granting non-refundable subsidies to the Alentejo [region] flood and storm victims, which was turned into such a media-oriented “charity parade” that a columnist close to the PS correctly pointed out that “a democratic government cannot behave like the MNF [National Women’s Movement, of the fascist period]. We could recall the Prime-Minister’s silence, when he should be drawing the necessary conclusions from the events that led to the long drawn-out resignation of Admiral Fuzeta da Ponte, and to the Defence Minister’s serious statement according to which the Armed Forces are incapable of guaranteeing the strategic defence of the whole of the nation’s territory, something which at the very least reveals clearly that the minister is inadequate for the post, and just as clearly that he feels uncomfortable holding that post after April [1974] and within the framework of the Constitution. [the current Defence Minister was Education Minister in one of the last fascist governments in the early ‘70s]

I also think that PS members generally cannot but feel discomfort at the praise heaped by big business lords and by the leaders of bosses’ confederations upon the current governance. An example of this were the sarcastic statements made by the Industrial Association’s President (in “Público”, 1997-12-25): “It is often said that PS governments are the best for entrepreneurs because they govern on the right...”.

You cannot hide neo-liberal policies — policies of wealth concentration, of growing domination of economic powers over the media and over the political power structure — with measures such as for example the Guaranteed Minimum Income, or more kindergartens. And even these measures had to be “pushed along” by our Party in parliament. Even in terms of values, it is unfortunately a fact that with these policies hypocrisy has triumphed over truthfulness, solidarity has become devalued and society has become more tolerant toward inequality and injustice.

Strengthening the PCP, for a change in policy

As the statement issued by the 14-15 February Central Committee meeting warned, it is to be expected that as the general election draws near, the PS and PSD will increasingly attempt to lock voters into the false choice between keeping the PS in government with right-wing policies or returning the right to power. A progressive and left-wing alternative to PS-PSD alternation is possible.

For there to be a change in course, what is needed is for the PCP’s proposals to have a growing role in political practice. That is to say, for there to be government on the left it is necessary to have a stronger PCP, and it is necessary to change the balance of forces between PS and PCP, particularly in the electoral sphere. If in the last general election the PS had not had a majority so close to an absolute majority, and if the PCP had had more votes, the policies followed by this government would have been different, much more favourable toward Portugal and its people.

It is therefore of the utmost importance that the workers and all those Portuguese who aspire to a political change should understand — and it is particularly outside the pre-election debate that this learning should take place — that what counts when a government is formed is not which party got the most votes, but which majority is formed in parliament. That what counts is that PCP and PS MPs should outnumber right-wing MPs. But that the balance of forces between these two parties’ MPs counts.

It is of the utmost importance that a growing number of Portuguese people should understand that more votes for the PCP and the CDU [electoral alliance] is something that always has a two-fold advantage: these votes always count in helping to beat the right, and they strengthen the left-wing’s (PCP, unaffiliated citizens, PS left wing) pressure for left-wing policies for the country.

But for this to happen it is also necessary — besides our more dynamic participation at all levels, our presentation of alternative proposals, and a stepping up of the mass struggle — to overcome prejudices and pre-conceived ideas as to what we really are and want, and as to what we really stand for.

It is therefore necessary to make a major effort to convince others, and to wage a great struggle so that all Portuguese people can truthfully get to know us. That means get to know our election programs, the bills we presented in parliament, what we stand for (both within the institutions and outside them), to get to know our project for Portugal, what we stand for, and what we fight for. Democracy, pluralism and political democracy, which in themselves have intrinsic value, are for us not tactical or formal concepts but fundamental values. So too are economic democracy — with the coexistence of various forms of property —democracy in social terms, and cultural democracy.

For this reason we state that our country needs not less, but more democracy, more pluralism, more social justice and more truthfulness in elections. The PS and PSD want to change the election laws in an anti-democratic direction, imposing single-member constituencies. Their main goal is to pressure voters into concentrating their votes on these two parties. This has to be countered. Truthfulness in elections, freedom, openness, democracy and social justice are fundamental directions for a positive change in our society.

While rejecting “models”, we, Portuguese communists, have our sights set on socialism. We have strong grounding in our own history and in our struggle throughout these past 77 years, based on deepening democracy (with its various components), on the experience of [the] April [revolution] and on a renewed project that can encompass all that is most positive: from practical reality, from past experience, and from what the future will bring to the development of humankind. And it is by continuing the struggle, looking to the future, confident in the need and possibility of building a new society, that we also render the best tribute to the 150 years of the “Manifesto of the Communist Party” and its up-to-date content.

But for this struggle to be successful, for our links with the working class, the working people and local communities to be effective, for political initiative to be more present in all Party bodies, particularly at the grassroots level, it is also necessary to activate all organizations and to proceed — with determination and without holding back — to effect renewal and rejuvenation. The growing flow of young people into the Party (which pleases us all), with their specificity, their own way of being and living, is something that must be followed, placing great emphasis on organising and assigning them greater responsibilities at all levels.

Party renewal and activation is a vital prerequisite for all our work to strengthen our political, social and electoral influence. This is the meaning and direction of the major period of reflection, debate, decision-making and adoption of measures that is underway. It can and should provide new organisational impetus, greater affirmation for our Party, and a greater influence in Portuguese society.

We want a Party which — with its identity reaffirmed at our last Congress — can be increasingly active, effective, open toward society and geared to the future.

A Party that must not be viewed as an abstract entity which is distant from its members — an attitude which is sometimes revealed in statements such as “the Party hasn’t come here lately”. No! The Party is a living body, made up of men and women, of young people, it is made up of members, which means us, who collectively and individually make up the Portuguese Communist Party, this great Party of the left, this Party which makes a difference, which is irreplaceable, which embraces the most generous causes, which does not turn its back on difficulties, which stands and will always stand with the workers and the people, with Portugal.

A Party which wants to strengthen its ties with, and roots among, the workers and the people. It wants to intensify its openness toward society in a dynamic dialogue — respecting differences — with those social and political forces whose opinions, experience and participation are essential levers in achieving a left-wing outcome.

We will continue, as we have done throughout these past 77 years, to raise the banners of social progress, of peace, of an end to exploitation and oppression of man by man.

We will continue, as we have done throughout these past 77 years, to be communists and Portuguese, not tied to mind-sets of the past or to dead formulas, but open to the “fruitful tree of life” and to change, with our own design and project of socialism for Portugal arising out of our analysis and enriched by our own experience and by that of other peoples, confident in the workers’ liberation struggle and convinced of the indispensable need to transform society.

We will continue, with the youth, with the women, with the workers and the people, upholding their yearnings and just demands, intransigently upholding Portugal’s sovereignty and independence.