Colombo -- 5 January 2013
These differences are not all minor or sectarian, as the parties involved originate in counter posed 20th century Marxist traditions namely: pro-Moscow Communism; Maoism; and Trotskyism. These currents have had historically profound conflicts on the relationship between party and class; the strategy for socialist revolution; and concepts of democracy and political pluralism, among many other questions.
The recent unification highlights three global trends: (1) the recomposition of the national
Left is either ongoing or presents itself as a task for revolutionaries; (2)
there is no ‘one size fits all’ model for regroupment; and (3) the difficulties
of unity are worsened by the weakness of the workers movement and the aggression
of neoliberal capitalism and other reactionary ideologies and forces, like the
military and the mullahs in Pakistan.
In Pakistan, it was the revived left-wing National
Students Federation that pushed the leaderships of the three parties to combine:
recognising that the whole would be greater than the sum of its parts; and it
is the youth who have been most enthusiastic supporters of this political
project.
Another motivation, says general secretary Farooq
Tariq, “was to strengthen the labour and peasant movement that [the Left
parties] were able to build in parts of the country over the years. The
movements were in some confusion about the three parties pursuing similar
ideology and tactics with three different names”.
Merging from Below
An interesting decision was taken by the leaders of
the three Pakistani parties not to merge from the ‘top’, that is through an
organisational merger of the parties; but rather to unify from ‘below’, through
dissolving their individual parties; and recommending their former members to
join the new party as individuals.
The reason for so doing is for the former members to
voluntarily accept the common programme and identity of the new party, and
therefore transcend former allegiances and loyalties, while thinking anew about
old questions and contemporary issues.
The Awami Workers Party will struggle for a
democratic, secular, and socialist Pakistan. Some key ideas in its programme are
for a pro-people foreign policy; recognition of the multinational character of
Pakistan and for a genuine federal system based on the right of
self-determination for all nations; break from the dictates of multinational
capital and imperialism; and replacing the existing and oppressive state
institutions with those that provide for basic needs and are democratic.
An immediate objective for the new party is to
increase its representation and participation of women. This challenge, which
exists everywhere, is intensified in Pakistan following the rise of Islamist
ideologies that discriminate against women’s participation in politics and
public life; and the insecurity caused by terror outfits and religious sectarian
violence in its cities.
Initially, the interim leadership of the new party only
included one woman. When this was criticised by many inside and outside the
party, instead of making excuses or being inflexible, the existing leadership sensibly
and quickly co-opted six more women. Currently, women comprise 40 percent of
the interim Executive Committee.
Campaign for Mass Party
Not content to regroup the organised Left, the Awami
Workers Party, has also embarked on a national campaign to become a mass party of
hundreds of thousands of members; and to establish itself in provinces and
regions where the Left has been marginal or even absent.
This ambition if realised, as we hope it will, brings
its own problems that the Left in Sri Lanka would be fortunate to face.
How to rapidly transform the discontented into class-conscious
militants opposed to all forms of exploitation and oppression, regardless of
the identity of the abuser and the abused? How to turn recruits into socialist
activists in workplaces, in neighbourhoods, and in mass organisations, instead
of only passive or paper members?
The Awami Workers Party has received electoral
registration and will contest in general elections due this year. It is also
confident of gaining seats in provincial parliaments and local bodies. Between
30 April and 1 May, the first convention of the new party will elect its
leadership, on the basis of its new structures and members.
The regroupment of the Left is not a short-cut to
success for revolutionaries in bad times, or a quick-fix solution to the crisis
of credibility of socialism. This is also clear from the successes and failures
of Left unity initiatives across the world over the past two decades. However,
as hard and risky as the recomposition of the Left has been and will be, it is a
strategic task for Marxists in the 21st century.
(Published in Sinhala-language Haraya newspaper of January 2013)
(Published in Sinhala-language Haraya newspaper of January 2013)
