The Central Committee, having met on February 9th, 2015, analyzed the recent aspects of the national and international situation, as well as the evolution of the European Union and its crisis; evaluated the situation of the Country and the causes and those responsible associated with the path of national decline; debated and established the central elements of struggle for a rupture with the right-wing policy and for the affirmation of a patriotic and left-wing policy. The Central Committee also debated the central ideas regarding intervention in the legislative elections this year that, articulated with the mass struggle, constitutes an important moment in the struggle for an alternative policy; and identified the directions for work aimed towards reinforcing the Party organization and its political initiative.
 
I – The right wing policy and the worsening of the economic and social situation

 1. The extension and gravity of the problems present in the Portuguese society, and in many of its areas and sectors, undeniably reflect the failure of 38 years of right-wing policies in the resolution of the national problems and the increased dependency of the Country on the directives from the European Union and the countries and interests that command it.
 
2. The economic and social situation, the degradation of family incomes, the dimension of unemployment, the chaos verified in hospital emergency care, in the justice system and in opening of the school year, the new developments in the privatization of TAP, the dismantlement of the rail sector and the process of sale of PT/Portugal to Altice, now consummated, are some examples of the destructive action of the PSD/CDS-PP (Social Democratic Party/ Social and Democratic Center-Popular Party) government and of a concrete reality that afflicts millions of Portuguese.

Despite the significant drop in the price of oil, the devaluing of the euro and the low interest rates, the truth is that the data on external commerce — revealing a worsening trade deficit – as well as the continuing fall in investment and the anemic evolution of GDP (after the fall between 2009 and 2014 of about 6.7%) and the level of public and private debt, all confirm the path of absence of answers to the serious economic problems, regardless of how much the government’s propaganda is intensified around the alleged economic recovery with increased employment, and confirm once more the incompatibility between pursuing a right-wing policy and a policy of sustained economic growth and social development.

The Central Committee of PCP alerts to the concerning dimension of unemployment and poverty. An expression of the policy of exploitation and impoverishment, the poverty rate in Portugal, according to the National Statistics Institute (INE), increased 45% between 2009 and 2013, with more than 800 thousand Portuguese being pushed into this situation. The increasing number of active workers and unemployed that fall into poverty and the accentuated growth in the disparity between the rich and poor testify that the policies of exploitation have increased inequalities and injustice.
 
3. The brutal anti-social and anti-popular escalation — which in the last three years has been imposed in the name of the crisis and that increased social inequalities, languished productive capacity, aggravated regional asymmetries, alienated strategic positions and resources, mortgaged national sovereignty and impoverished the democratic regime — cannot be deluded by the ongoing electoral maneuvering and others the Government may come to adopt.

It is in this context that the ongoing offensive is integrated, aimed at reconfiguring the role of the State and the privatization of part of its functions, among which: the redefinition of the public administration oriented towards the accelerated reduction of social functions and responsibilities of the State and the attempt of dumping on municipalities the responsibility for important social areas, like education, health, social security and culture; the so-called process of requalification, a prelude to lay-offs in the Public Administration, as is occurring in Social Security; or the process of privatizing TAP, which if concluded, as has happened with the privatization of other strategic companies, would lead to its destruction, the same thing happening with the sale of PT/Portugal to Altice, two important strategic companies, fundamental towards the development of the country.

The works of the Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry into the situation in BES/GES (Espirito Santo Bank and Group), proposed by PCP, despite the obstacles placed before its normal functioning, have already allowed, on the one hand, the revelation of an obscure web that has been the practice of the financial system and the monopolies, on the margins or in violation of the law and far from any control by the political or regulatory authorities; and on the other hand, has provided evidence, given the nature and objective of the private banks, that it is not possible to ensure a credit policy in accordance with national interests and transparency in this institutions.

In a framework of destruction of national production, the interdiction of sardine fishing, with disastrous consequences for an already weakened sector and with negative impacts on the canned food and fish processing industries, as well as the destruction of the Casa do Douro as a public-law institution with powers of regulation of the production and commerce of wines from the Controlled Region of Douro, namely Port wine, are real examples of a policy at the service of the interests of national and foreign big capital.

Reiterating its constant position against the existence of foreign military bases in national territory, PCP considers unacceptable the unilateral decision of the US regarding the Lajes Base (in Azores) and demands that the Portuguese government abandon its position of subservience and demand from the US government due compensation for the economic, social and environmental consequences of this decision and decades of occupation of this base.

The Central Committee of PCP noted the developments that following the elections in Greece translate into an inadmissible process of interference, blackmail and pressure by the European Union, namely regarding sovereign debts. And underlines, in particular, the subservient attitude and the relinquishing of our Country’s interests — also confronted with an unsustainable debt — to the usury of financial markets, which the PSD/CDS-PP government and prime-minister have confirmed over the last few days. In this framework it is unavoidable to register the alignment of the Socialist Party and its secretary-general with the positions of the government (namely in the consideration that the debt is sustainable and in refusing its renegotiation). PCP reaffirms, as it has done insistently since April 2011, that the sovereign development of the Country demands the renegotiation of the debt in its amounts, deadlines and interest rates, in order to guarantee a debt service compatible with economic growth, the creation of employment and the needs for public investment and revitalization of the internal market.

4. PCP continues to firmly fight the policies of the European Union that attack social and labor rights, the development of the Country and national sovereignty, and that merely contribute, as proven by reality, to the deepening of the crisis.

The recent measured advanced by the European Union, among which we highlight the decision of the ECB of injecting colossal sums into the financial and speculative system, essentially constitute, together with the so-called Juncker package (a grand propaganda maneuver), a benefit for capital, namely the big financial capital. Such measures confirm the persistency and depth of the economic crisis in the European Union and the Euro Zone, and affirm themselves as palliatives with no impact on the revitalization of economic activity.

PCP considers that only a rupture with the policies, norms and guidelines that have marked the European process of capitalist integration — the Economic and Monetary Union as well as the Budget Treaty, Economic Governance and the Banking Union now implemented — can contribute towards the solution to the enormous economic and social problems that are worsening, towards improving living conditions, towards recovering rights and affirming and exercising the sovereignty of peoples.
The Central Committee of PCP considers that the electoral results in Greece represent an expressive defeat of the parties that have governed the country who, with the European Union, are responsible for the policy of economic and social disaster wherein they dragged the Greek workers and people. The results express the profound discontent and a will for change translated into the votes achieved by Syriza, the political force with most votes. The result achieved by the Communist Party of Greece will contribute to pursue the struggle it develops in defense of the interests of the workers and people. Condemning the pressures and blackmail of the European Union, the Central Committee of PCP reaffirms that only an effective rupture with the policies, instruments and mechanisms of capitalist integration can provide a solution to the serious economic and social problems affecting the European Union countries. Only this path may in fact respect the sentiments the Greek people expressed in the recent elections. Reiterating its solidarity with the Greek workers and people, the Central Committee of PCP underlines that the full accomplishment of its aspiration and the defense of national sovereignty are inseparable from its intervention and struggle.

5. The international situation is still marked by the structural crisis of capitalism and by the exploitation and aggression of imperialism, which has seen new developments. PCP alerts to the dangerous situation in the Ukraine, namely with the militaristic escalation, on the part of the coup power in Kiev, inseparable from imperialism’s strategy of confrontation and siege of the Russian Federation, as well as to the intensification of Israel’s policy of aggression against the Palestinian people. The Central Committee of PCP condemns the upsurge of terrorism (inseparable from imperialism’s support of fundamentalist organizations and its aggressive policies in several Middle Eastern countries), as well as State terrorism, and alerts to the promotion of racist and xenophobic sentiments, and new measures against democratic rights and freedoms, using the Paris attacks as a pretext.

The Central Committee of PCP salutes the important victory of Cuba, of the Cuban people and internationalist solidarity represented by the release of the five Cuban heroes unjustly imprisoned in the US, and reaffirms its solidarity towards the Cuban people in its struggle towards the end of the blockade and the reinforcement of socialism.

The Central Committee of PCP also salutes the struggle of the workers and peoples who, under extremely complex and difficult conditions, is being developed in several countries in all continents, and expresses its solidarity with the political and social forces that resist imperialism’s offensive, considering that convergence in action of communist parties, forces for social progress and national liberation is more necessary today than ever.
 
6. The Country and the Portuguese are confronted with a political, economic and social framework that must be urgently ended. The deepening of the economic and social crisis, the development of the political and institutional crisis, with successive scandals of corruption by high figures of the State apparatus and judicial processes against former leaders, as well as the development of a posture of collusion, involvement and submission of Portugal to foreign interests urge the defeat of the right-wing policies and the PSD/CDS-PP government as a national imperative.
 
II — No to the national decline. Solutions for the Country
 
1. The Country presents, as a direct result of 38 years of right-wing policies and 28 years of capitalist integration in the European Union, the marks of a process that, in the service of the reconstitution of the monopolies and reinforcement of their power, led to economic decline, a social retrocession unprecedented since fascism and the alienation of important parts of national sovereignty.

The policies of exploitation that, invoking the crisis, PS, PSD and CDS-PP promoted through the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP) and the Pact of Aggression, and under the purview of the European Union and the IMP led the Country into the greatest period of recession and economic stagnation of the last decades, liquidated or denied constitutional rights, deprived hundreds of thousands of Portuguese from achieving in their country the future they have a right to, compromised and withered the productive sector, destroyed the productive capacity of its industry, agriculture and fisheries, alienated strategic sectors essential for development, promoted the reconfiguration of the State towards the service of monopolistic capital, fostered the decay of political life and the multiplication of cases of corruption. A policy that, in open conflict with the Republic’s Constitution, violated rights, liberties and guarantees, and put in question the normal working of institutions.
 
2. The dimension of the current problems demands not the deepening and continuation of a policy determined by the logic of domination of monopolistic capital, exposing the Country to a succession of destructive crises, but a rupture with this policy and the implementation of an alternative policy, patriotic and left-wing committed to the values of April.

There are no political artifices, no word games, that obscure the crucial issue regarding an alternative policy: only a policy that breaks with the axes and options of the right, that abandons an orientation determined by the objective of capitalist accumulation and intensification of the exploitation of labor, that faces and confronts the constraints and conditions of the European Union, its instruments and objectives of usurpation of sovereignty can achieve this alternative.

Building an alternative is inseparable from a rupture with the right-wing policy and the broadening of a social and political base that supports a patriotic and left-wing policy. Two elements, two intertwined conditions, whose apprehension is crucial to break from rotation of the promoters of the continuation of a policy that for 38 years has ruined the Country and the life of Portuguese. Achieving the alternative demands a clear and unequivocal reestablishment of a trajectory that will make it possible: the assumed option of rupture with all the right-wing policy’s structuring axes. The question is not one of staging dialogue over intelligent or crafty forms of achieving a right-wing policy but, clearly, each one assuming how they intend to break from it. That is the border separating alternative from alternation.
 
3. Breaking with the right-wing policy and raising an alternative, patriotic and left-wing policy is a national imperative. An imperative that corresponds to a legitimate aspiration of the workers and people, of all democrats and patriots who do not accept the path of drowning to which the right has been condemning the Country.

It is towards implementing this alternative that PCP is genuinely committed. An objective not only necessary but possible, as indispensable as unpostponable. The patriotic and left-wing alternative that Portugal needs does not depend solely on PCP, but is not achievable without PCP, much less against PCP. An alternative policy and a political alternative, whose achievement is intertwined with: the action and struggle of the workers and people; the broadening of the social front who, in opposition with the right-wing policy, affirms the right of the Country to an independent and sovereign development; the broadening of the convergence between social sectors and forces, of all democrats and patriots who, unresigned to the path of disaster the right has led the country upon, want to intervene and affirm that another policy is possible, one rooted in the values of April, that will make effective and recover constitutionally enshrined rights; the reinforcement of PCP and its social and political influence, and the increase of the electoral expression of CDU - United Democratic Coalition and the number of deputies that will integrate the parliamentary groups of PCP and the Green Ecologist Party (PEV).

The Central Committee of PCP highlights and values the irreplaceable role the mass struggle has played and plays in resisting the offensive against rights and incomes of workers and the people, in the social isolation of the present government and the parliamentary majority which has led to a strong political condemnation, to elevating the social and political consciousness of broad sectors of the population on the causes and those responsible for the current situation. A role that needs to now be reflected in the affirmation and demand for rupture with the dominant policy and the building of an alternative policy.

4. Inseparable from the national situation and all the factors that determine their evolution, the Central Committee of the PCP stresses the importance that this year’s parliamentary elections assume in the context of the intervention and broader struggle for a rupture with the right-wing policy and of the affirmation and materialisation of an alternative policy.

The PCP presents itself to the Portuguese people as the Party:

• Of national sovereignty and independence, which affirms the right of the Portuguese people to decide their future, which denounces and faces foreign conditionings and constraints that deepen the policy of exploitation and impoverishment, which rejects the growing submission of Portugal to the European Union and its main instruments – from the Euro to the Budgetary Treaty - which PSD, PS and CDS-PP intend to perpetuate;

• of unity and democratic convergence, which clearly proposes a patriotic and left-wing policy to all democrats and patriots who wish to act and contribute for a rupture in national political life, ready for dialogue and action in a framework of mutual respect and without hegemonic aims, incompatible with the manoeuvres and movements that, in the name of repeated “left” promises or calls for artificial novelties, not only aim to hinder the growth of the most consistent and necessary force for the rupture, while creating the grounds for the survival of the right-wing policy, either in its most liberal or social-democratizing expression;

• of truth and political seriousness, facing the lies and falsehoods transformed into official policy, which denounces the demagoguery and the populism that flourishes in the shadow of the right-wing policy, which warns about new illusions and repeated promises of change, which in the current torrent of corruption and illegal acts proves that it is different and that parties are not equal, which assumes and presents a path of truth, of an acknowledged respect for the promises, of honesty, work and competence, which life has shown and shows to be true;

• of combat against the right-wing policy, which shows an acknowledged course of intervention and struggle in defence of the workers and the people, which was present at all times and in places where it was necessary to assert rights, fight injustice, defend employment, working hours and wages, which did not resort to the comfortable attitude assumed by others of watching from the sidelines the destructive work of the PSD / CDS-PP government;

• of an alternative policy, of proven commitment to the People and the Country with proposals and solutions able to give expression to a patriotic and left-wing policy identified with the aspirations of the workers and of the Portuguese people for a better, more dignified and fairer life, aimed at the sovereign affirmation of Portugal as a free and independent nation, committed to the April values;

• of the only real option that will never fail a patriotic and left-wing policy, which gives assurances that the support and votes received will not be put at the service of agreements with the right or to pursue the right-wing policy.

5. The Central Committee calls on the militants and organisations of the PCP and CDU activists to create a campaign built on a confident mobilization, on actions to bring direct explanation, to inform the solutions for the Country, to overcome resignation and conformism, denouncing the manoeuvres of ideological diversion, to dispel old and new illusions intended to perpetuate the same policy and conceal the real alternative.

A campaign of nationwide expression and dimension, taking into account the intervention with prioritary layers and sectors, with emphasis on the set of issues present in the popular concerns and also in the aspirations, contributing to clarify and explain the causes and origins of the economic and social situation afflicting the Country and the lives of millions of Portuguese, enhancing the course of the courageous and consequent intervention of the PCP and CDU whenever it was necessary to assert and defend rights, to clear misunderstandings on how to vote CDU - the PCP-PEV Broad Democratic Coalition.

A campaign that boldly brings together, involves and commits thousands of men, women and youth without any party affiliation, democrats and patriots who see in CDU a heritage of work, honesty and competence, who know that in CDU and in its strengthening lies the most decisive factor in the materialisation of an alternative policy.

A campaign that:

• Affirms with confidence that another policy is possible, that it lies in the hands of the workers and the people with their action, their struggle and their vote to give it support and viability;

• denounces the right-wing policy, its consequences and those responsible;

• destroys the mystifications that seek to undermine the determination and the will to take the option to break, in fact, with the right-wing policy;

• portrays that the PCP and the CDU have solutions for the Country and that they are achievable and urgent;

• denounces those who, classifying PCP’s and CDU’s solutions for the country as unrealistic or radical, aim to disguise their option for the political axes that keep the country tied to dependence and decline;

• shows that those who seek to reduce the PCP to a mere force of protest and conceal its consistent action of resistance to the government's excesses, do so to justify their course of complicity and support for the right-wing policies and the current majority;

• clarifies that not only there is no contradiction between protest, consequent struggle and the affirmation of an alternative and of solutions for the country, like those seeking to counter, aiming to hide the reasons why they did not vote or did not support the hundreds of proposals submitted by the PCP which, if adopted, would have spared the country and the people many difficulties and hardships;

• shows that is not enough to proclaim the rejection of the concept of "the arch of governing parties" when, in practice, in terms of policy proposals for the country they revolve under what has been the arch of the right-wing policies that have been sinking Portugal for the last 38 years.

6. The Central Committee stresses the importance of PCP’s National Meeting "No to national decline. Solutions for the Country “to be held on February 28 at the Peace and Friendship Pavilion in the municipality of Loures.

With the aim of discussing the economic and social situation, the evaluation of policies and those responsible for the country's problems and to identify the main constraints to its development, as well as the lines of rupture with the right-wing policy, the patriotic and left-wing policy and the way to achieve it, the National Meeting is part of the overall action of the Party as an important contribution for its strengthening and for the development and intensification of political action, being the most relevant factor in the projection of intervention in the important political battle of this year’s parliamentary elections.

7. The Central Committee of the PCP establishes the most immediate lines of electoral intervention, articulated and integrated in the Party's general action:

• The development of national action "The strength of the people, for a Portugal with a future, a patriotic and left-wing policy” which, in combination with the preparation of the electoral Programme of the PCP, broadens the participation and contribution of social , economic and cultural organisations, of democrats and patriots, in identifying key objectives and proposals for an alternative policy;

• the launching, after March 12, of a large contact action and explanation focused on: affirming the alternative policy that the PCP proposes; listen and encourage the contribution of the workers and the people to identify proposals and policies to meet their aspirations; increase awareness to the possibility of their materialisation through the will, intervention and vote of each and every one;

• the promotion, until May, of a vast range of locally based initiatives which, while affirming the values of work, honesty, competence and presenting solutions for a better life, establish a convergent intervention in the municipality and in the country, and involves and mobilizes elected CDU members, candidates and activists;

• the continuation of "Action and Dialogue for a Patriotic and Left-wing Policy", continuing the debate and reflection with independent persons engaged in the rupture with the course of economic and social disaster that the right-wing policy has led the country into;

• the realization of commemorative initiatives of the April Revolution, to broaden the unitary dynamics around CDU, to affirm the patriotic and left-wing policy and the heightening of April values in a developed and sovereign Portugal.

8. The Central Committee alerts to the manoeuvres that, given the inevitable political and electoral defeat of the current majority (despite the demagogic manoeuvres that PSD and CDS-PP will seek to adopt using the Government), designed to ensure the maintenance of the essential aspects of the right-wing policy - either in terms of macroeconomic options, the submission to the power of economic and financial groups, or the acceptance of EU dictates - and weaken the political and institutional conditions for a real rupture with that policy.

Manoeuvres and operations that promote populist solutions based on an anti-party discourse, in appeals to alleged new political expressions valorised in their form, while hiding content, and even the emergence of others determined by the exploration of values contrary to democracy. Manoeuvres and operations that are a crucial factor in promoting PS, following its last Congress.

The Central Committee of the PCP stresses that more than a repositioning to the left or of any genuine pursuit of convergence to break with the right-wing policy, what is seen in PS is the reaffirmation of the well known ambition for absolute power. A position that has three central and articulated factors as a strategic line: feed the illusion of a repositioning of the PS to the left selling the idea that it not only seeks to make a break with the current government policy but also with the path the previous leadership of Seguro (without defending it); presume a new attitude of dialogue to the left and remaining open to convergence; seek to attribute to third parties (in this case the PCP) the responsibility for not answering to the apparent new attitude of the PS.

A strategic line that is designed to support a central objective: to, under a created excuse of not having partners to ensure a stable governing solution, claim an absolute majority built by collecting votes on the left, in order to subsequently use them, as the leader of the PS himself implies, to support the right-wing policy and any new agreements with the PSD and / or the CDS-PP.

9. The alternative that the country needs, a matter of urgency, is the proposed patriotic and left-wing policy that the PCP presents, the essential basis for its implementation. A policy based: on the renegotiation of the debt, its amounts, interest and term of payment; the promotion and valorisation of national production and job creation; recovery for the public control of strategic sectors and companies, in particular the financial sector; the restoration of wages, pensions and workers' and people’s incomes; defence of public services and social functions of the state, namely the rights to education, health and social protection; a fiscal policy that alleviates the burden on workers' incomes and those of micro, small and medium-size enterprises and heavily taxes the income and the assets of big business, profits and financial speculation; rejection of the submission to the impositions of the Euro and the European Union, recovering for the country its economic, budgetary and monetary policy.

10. The Central Committee of the PCP stresses the importance of continuing and deepening political action around these proposals and insists that the PCP will always, with determination, help to build a true patriotic and left-wing political alternative, for which its political and electoral strengthening are a crucial and unavoidable condition.

PCP carries a unique heritage in Portuguese society, of struggle and commitment to the convergence and unity of all democrats and patriots, for progressive changes in our country. So it was in the struggle for freedom during the fascist regime, during the revolutionary process following April 25 and in defence of the achievements of the revolution. Aware of the urgency to build an alternative now and the importance of its commitment towards its materialisation, the PCP will not fail to assume its responsibilities in promoting, finding spaces and paths to bring together wills and foster the energies of all those men, women and youth engaged in materialising a patriotic and left-wing policy.

The Central Committee of the PCP reaffirms that the party is ready to assume all the responsibilities that the Portuguese people decide to give for the struggle to make a rupture with the right-wing policy, to build a patriotic and left-wing alternative or to govern the country, to implement a new policy at the service of the workers, the people and of a Portugal with a future, freedom, development, social progress and sovereignty.

III - Develop the mass struggle. Strengthen the Party's organization and intervention

1. The Central Committee of the PCP highlights the scale of the ongoing political intervention and mass struggle and the role of the Party and underlines the great demands placed on the action of the party collective.

The Central Committee stresses the importance of the prosecution of the workers’s struggle, particularly the struggles in the transport sector, local administration workers' actions, the demonstration of public administration workers on January 30, as well as many other actions in companies and workplaces and appreciates the struggles carried out by the people in defence of their rights.

The Central Committee points the need for the commitment of all Party organisations, following the aspirations and specific problems of the workers, people and all anti-monopolistic strata, to dynamize the struggle for their resolution, in the broader context of the struggle to defeat the right-wing policy and the materialisation of a Patriotic and Left-wing alternative. In this context, stands out the national day with demonstrations across the country set by the CGTP-IN for March 7, the celebration of March 8, International Women's Day, the national strike by Public Administration Trade Unions on March 13,, the National March " Youth on the March - Work with rights! Against precariousness and exploitation " with localized actions, 23-27 March, that culminate with a demonstration on March 28 in Lisbon, the preparation of the celebrations of April 25 and the great action of May 1st.

2. The Central Committee calls on the whole Party, in the context of the large and intense political activity the party collective will have to face in the near future - and highlighting PCP's National Meeting scheduled for February 28, under the slogan "No to national decline. Solutions for the Country ", the preparation of the elections for the Assembly of the Republic to be held this year and the early elections for the Legislative Assembly of the Autonomous Region of Madeira on 29 March, the intensification of the Party’s political intervention in answer to the problems and aspirations of the workers and the people – to include the celebrations of the Party’s 94th.Aniversary as a time to enhance and affirm the liberating and emancipating content of the project contained in its Programme, using the many initiatives that will take place throughout the country.

As part of the ongoing political initiative in the general action plan of the Party and the institutional intervention, particularly in the Assembly of the Republic and the European Parliament, the Central Committee highlights: the draft resolution to hold an intergovernmental conference aimed at the renegotiation of the debt and the repeal of the Budgetary Treaty and the promotion of a set of public hearings on these matters; the proposal to hold, in the Assembly of the Republic, a broad hearing process on the taxation of large national and multinational companies operating in Portugal; strengthening the fight against corruption and economic and financial crime, including a draft law on the criminalization of unjustified enrichment, based on the obligation of all citizens to declare and state the specific source and compatible with their legitimate income, the assets or large amounts coming into their possession.

Also noteworthy are the initiatives: in defence of public companies in the transport sector, rejecting the processes of privatization and dismantling, on the maintenance of a regulatory framework of the milk market at European level, the implementation of the Family Farming Charter; on research, innovation and job creation in the maritime economy and the measures that meet the problem created by the halt on sardine fishing; on the reclassification, with the revocation of the process, stopping the dismissal of Public Administration workers; on preventing the use of Employment Contracts of Social Inclusion, trainings and false self-employed receipts to meet permanent needs of services and businesses; holding responsible the right-wing policy and the government for increasing poverty in our country; and questioning the government and demanding the defence of the NHS and in providing quality health care.

3. The Central Committee, valuing the work already done, calls on all organisations to continue with commitment the organic strengthening of the Party, following the Resolution "More organization, more intervention, more influence. A stronger PCP "and reaffirms as first priority of the organic strengthening to pursue to the end, without hesitations, and as soon as possible, the action of contacts with members of the Party, taking the necessary measures by cadres and leadership according to each situation, and the importance of pursuing a broad task to recruit new members and their party integration by implementing the national recruitment campaign.

The Central Committee also stresses the results already obtained in the national fund raising campaign "Bigger space, Bigger Festival. Future with April ", with the need of measures to continue the interest and support shown in order to ensure its success and stresses the importance of the preparatory work of the 39th. edition of Avante! Festival to be held on September 4, 5 and 6.

4. In a complex international situation, where the dangers arising from the actions of imperialism and of the forces associated with it in each country clash with affirmations of the sovereign will of workers and peoples, and in view of a national situation marked by a course of worsening exploitation, impoverishment, limitations on democracy, attacks on sovereignty, social regression and national disaster, the Central Committee of the PCP stresses that it lies in the hands of the Portuguese workers and people with their strength, their achievements and their own objectives, pursuing the best experiences of a history of almost nine centuries, to defeat the right-wing policy, ensure the liberation from the domination of economic and financial groups and foreign submission and open the way of social and national liberation. The Central Committee of the PCP calls on all organisations and all Party members to, in close connection with democrats and patriots, workers, youth, the Portuguese people, take actions in this continuing struggle for a patriotic and left-wing policy, for an advanced democracy, inspired by the April values, for a Portugal with a future, for socialism and communism.

Lisbon, 9th February 2015