NO!!

About the referendum

Avantgarde, 27/6/15, Μετάφραση του «Όχι!!!» από τον PanPap

Under the suffocating pressure (which bordered on humiliation) of the lenders, the Greek government, being too weak to make a decision on its own, crawls towards a referendum next Sunday, on July the 5th.

Regardless of the reasons which led the government to this decision, it is a historic opportunity for a rematch with the capitalist mob of both the internal and the external troika.

The bourgeois reaction has already taken up battle positions. The New Democracy, the “River”, what remains of the PASOK, all the bourgeois political parties – as one – are screaming against the referendum and are trying to impose their own fake dilemmas. For them, the question is “yes or no to Europe”, not even yes or no to the Euro. With cheap stunts they are trying to avoid the real question, but they cannot hide: a “yes” vote means the acceptance of the measures of the lenders; it means the continuation of the bourgeois counterrevolution. It is more than certain that the reactionary human dust will attempt to make its move during the coming hours and days. The Euro-worshipping liberals, the courtyard of the usurers-lenders, the ludicrous far-right-wingers who are trembling that they might lose their privileges (of looting the public property and the sweat of the working class, privileges they held for decades) are now preparing their cacerolazo rallies while fantasizing about a colonel who will appear in order to save «democracy”.

The movement, the Left, the working class, the youth who, for five years now, have been suffering under the merciless attack against every kind of social and democratic right, must not leave any room for action to anyone who may try to block the referendum in any way. In this battle, the proletarian camp cannot stay neutral, supposedly to remain “pure”, not identifying itself with the government. A “no” to the ultimatum of the lenders may very well blow up the finance bubble that is leeching on mankind, threatening to strangle it. A “no” will stimulate the anti-capitalist movement worldwide, opening up a new round of class confrontation, while simultaneously revealing the weakness of the decadent western imperialist empire.

The government’s request for a one-week extension in order to maintain the ECB’s emergency funding mechanism is most likely to be rejected. It is obvious that the plan of the lenders and their friends within Greece includes closed banks and Euro-worshipping liberals out in the streets screaming for the Euros during the week before the referendum. Under no circumstances can we leave the situation to chance or, worse, at the hands of the bourgeois reaction. On Saturday the workers’ movement, the hundreds of thousands who participated in demonstrations, who fought at the barricades, who clashed with the forces of repression during the last five years must be out in the streets. The Initiative for a People’s Assembly at the Syntagma has already issued a call for a gathering at the square on Saturday and Sunday afternoon. A first major rally must take place on Sunday evening.

In any case, breaking with the memoranda and the bourgeois counterrevolution puts the tasks of the day after on the table. We repeat what we were saying three months ago: «Should the negotiations be led, even by accident, to a rupture, the workers’ movement and the Left (wherever they may be) must be the ones who determine the course of developments. Any attempt by the deep state and capital to intervene, organizing any type of coup, must be dealt with accordingly. At the same time, no rupture can last if it is not accompanied by an emergency programme of direct social and economic measures to defend the living standards of the poor, the low paid and the unemployed. In retaliation to the economic strangling that the international capital and its institutions will impose, together with the sabotage by the local bourgeoisie, all the privatizations of the last 6 years must be cancelled and nationalized without any compensation. TV-channels, construction companies, banks and local interests that supported and benefited from the memoranda after they ransacked public property must also be nationalized and their owners’ property, being the product of illegal enrichment at the expense of society, must be expropriated. Businesses that were shut down after they were ransacked or driven to bankruptcy must be opened again with the support of the state and under the management of the workers themselves. From the first moment, imports and exports as well as all capital movements must be subjected to centralized control and remain under this control for as long as any imposition of penalties and exclusions from any kind of moneylenders and creditors persists. A cap on cash withdrawals from the banks must also be imposed and, if necessary, an alternative currency at a one-to-one rate. It is obvious that any servicing of the debt stops in perpetuum. On the internal front: restoration of labour legislation and protection of workers’ rights against employer arbitrariness; labour inspectorates with the physical presence of labour committees that will investigate any complaint against employer arbitrariness; finally, any attempt by criminal gangs to exploit the situation with thefts, robberies and all kinds of criminal activities must be crushed without mercy. In such conditions, it is necessary to control the police operations centre with political commissars who will not leave any room for provocations by the deep state. In any case, the defense of a different social perspective cannot depend on the old state apparatus. The movement must take care of its own self-defense. This is a real break, a revolutionary proletarian rupture …”