PARTIT KOMUNISTA MALTI: May 2016

Sunday, May 22, 2016

A Unique Debate on NATO to be Held in Malta,

A Unique Debate on NATO to be Held in Malta, on May 27th, 2016*

Friday 27, May 2016, From 18:30 am to around 20:30pm,

at Workers memorial Building , GWU, South Street Valletta

- 2nd Floor- Council Room-

FOR A PEACEFUL MEDITERRANEAN WITHOUT FEAR !

Alba Malta North Africa Coordination , the Anti imperialist Tricontinental Platform- England and Collettivo Askavusa from Lampedusa have the pleasure to invite you to this Public event .

We have special guest speakers for the first time In Malta speaking at the event,

Sukant Chandan, Indian Political Analyst specialist on the Global South, Tricontinental Platform, England-

Lucio Santin, expert on migration issues, From Collettivo Askavusa, Lampedusa , Italy

Voices of Ex Yugoslavia Community in Malta,

AND LIVE MUSIC : BACIALA QUESTA TERRA !

South to South !

FROM SICILY TO LATINOAMERICA

with Cesar, Fernando, Erno, Nolasco!

This last event will be dedicated to all the exiles people, refugees of NATO, forced to leave their homeland And to commemorate the 25th years of the Balkan wars.

Worker’s Day Message

On the occasion of the International Worker’s Day, the 1^st of May, The Communist Party of Malta said "that various workers in Malta are facing uncertainties as the right to regular and decent conditions of employment is not any more protected".

The Party added that “precarious work contracts are becoming the order of the day. Under these new conditions the workers suffer from precarious, insecure, uncertain, and unpredictable working conditions”.

“There is an urgency for progressive Trade unions, workers, social movements and the left in Malta to come together to confront this new type of exploitation, and struggle for a decent wage, a secure future, social protection, and access to rights. This universality and dimension of the problem, calls also, for a coordinated and comprehensive action at the international and European level”.

The Communist Party of Malta is also aware of the increase of the extreme right wing ideology which is on the rise in Europe. This ideology threatens the principle of worker’s solidarity and the emancipation of the working class. This false belief targets vulnerable workers, immigrants and other minorities, with the aim to alienate the workers from their real struggles towards social justice and a classless society”.

Communists call for policies that secure a better future for immigrants in Malta.

The Communist Party of Malta appeals to the political class and the independent media to give importance to the problems facing immigrants in Malta. The Party supports the initiative taken by the migrant community in organising a peaceful protest to raise awareness on their precarious situation.

“Serious issues with regards immigration, such as the right for a citizenship for those children born in Malta, the right to a secure future, decent jobs and the right to equal treatment should be on the national agenda. The Party added that "good governance is not only about fighting corruption, but also about the responsibility of governments and governing bodies to meet the needs of all the people in society, especially the most vulnerable, such as immigrants”.

Monday, May 2, 2016

Statement of the Secretariat of the European Communist Initiative on MAY 1st

We are honoring the struggles of the working class and the workers of the world.
As Communist Parties, we consider this day not as a holiday, not as a simple annual event, but as an international day of proletarian solidarity and struggle of the working class and all workers.

As communist women and men, we are proud of our ideology, our values and ideals, our struggle for social progress, for the rights of peoples, for the liberation of humanity and its emancipation from the yoke of capitalism.

In our days, the working class and the laboring masses all over the world are direct witnesses and first victims of the consequences of the deep economic and social crisis of the capitalist system, which principally hits them and also other people's strata.
Capitalism leads to the worsening of working conditions, wage cuts, unemployment, insecurity and poverty on the rise and the intensification of measures of repression against class resistance and is responsible for imperialist wars and military interventions, presented under false and deceptive pronouncements, for control of markets and raw materials and chiefly the energy resources.

This fact is even more evident today. The imperialist war and aggression generate bloodshed and poverty, from which enormous numbers of migrants are attempting to flee.

The Communists play the leading role in the struggle against imperialist wars and defend the principle of internationalist struggle, work for the unity of the working class, regardless of their nationality and religion, and for the common struggle concerning labour and social rights.

On May 1st, the Communists call the working class, the workers to strengthen their mass mobilizations and intensify the class struggle, against capital, its political representatives and the anti-people political line against NATO and the EU and the other imperialist unions.

The Communists strongly reaffirm the vanguard role of the working class as the creator of all wealth, and we stress the social and historical necessity to overturn capitalism via a revolution and build a social system, where the wealth belongs to those who produce it, and the political power belongs to the great majority of the people: the working class and its allies.

We state openly and firmly, that our goal is a society with no exploitation of man by man, no imperialist wars, no hunger, no unemployment, nor poverty.

We are fighting for a society, based on the workers' power, the socialization of the means of production, the scientific centralized planning and the real and substantial democracy for the working masses, a society that will satisfy the contemporary needs of the people.

We express our internationalist solidarity to the workers in struggle, wherever they are fighting for their rights and their future.

Long live the workers' May 1st!

Workers of the world, unite!

Worker’s Day Message

“There is an urgency for progressive Tradeunions, workers, social movements and the left in Malta to come together to confront this new type of exploitation, and struggle for a decent wage, a secure future, social protection, and access to rights. This universality and dimension of the problem, calls also, for a coordinated and comprehensive action at the international and European level”.

Communists against the Part-Privatization of the National Pension system.

The Communist Party of Malta deplores the way the Minister of Finance is addressing the pension reform. The strategy adopted, although it strengthens the basic minimum state pension, it also aims to part-privatize the national pension system.

“The national strategy, to opt for a second and third pillar schemes, is none other than the opening up of the state pension system to private institutions. These policies form part of the neo-liberal agenda dictated by the right wing gurus and the financial institutions”, stated the Communist Party of Malta.

The Communist Party of Malta urges the Trade unions and the working class to voice their opposition to such neo-liberal policies and to stop once and for all the privatization of the national pension system.

Some History

An organized Communist Party did not exist prior to 1969. Secret Communist cells existed in various periods from the 1920's onwards, but they were always small in number. Maltese communists militated either in the Communist Party of Great Britain, or in the Partito Comunista Italiano, or worked under cover within the Malta Labour Party, which was also infiltrated by the catholic clergy at that time, in an effort to prevent the Labour Party from taking a Marxist line, notably amongst these infiltrators was Mgr. Michael Gonzi, the future Archbishop of Malta and a faithful servant of the British Crown and a much bitter enemy of Malta’s Liberation Movement in Malta’s struggle for Independence in the late 1950's.
The Civil and ecclesiastical authorities were ever vigilant in their witch hunt, and this culminated in the 1933 sedition trails where a number of dockyard workers and intellectuals were imprisoned for the crime of possessing classical Marxist literature. This however proved to be a great setback for the progressive movement as it took years and years to get back on its feet again
. The major exponent of the bourgeoisie was the Nationalist Party, an irredentist party firmly believing that Malta was a part of Italy that had yet to be redeemed, from English occupation. Its leaders favored the Italian Language to Maltese, and openly shown sympathies towards Mussolini’s fascist Italian state. With the Second World War looming on the horizon the English colonial authorities sacked a Nationalist administration after winning an election with the aid of the Catholic Church who had imposed mortal sin on who ever voted for the Constitutional Party, a pro British Bourgeoisie party. This pro Italy position eventually led, to the internment of the Nationalist Party leadership on breakout of the war. After the Second World War it was the right wing turn now to suffer a setback. The Second World War changed completely the political scene in Malta; however the times were still difficult for the setting up of a Communist party.
At the Mayday celebrations of 1948, where in a dinner held by the Labour Party for the occasion. The English socialist anthem Scarlet Banner was sung by some leftists present of the at this event. This caused an incident which led to affidavits and statements by the leading members of the labour party in parliament and a witch hunt by the Catholic Church paper Lehen Is-Sewwa (The Voice of the Righteousness) and the British Colonial authorities.

DEMOCRACY DID NOT REALLY EXIST IN MALTA PRIOR TO 1971, not under the direct British Colonial rule, neither under the first Nationalist Administration after the 1964 independence. It was not possible to form a Communist Party. It was enough just to receive the "Soviet Weekly" from the United Kingdom, to find yourself watched and tailed by plainclothes policemen, and even taken to be interrogated by the Police. The Maltese Prime Minister in the early 1950’s took a film distributing company to court in order to stop the screening four Soviet films which the then, very harsh censors, had deemed them fit for viewing by the Maltese general public. Even Hollywood ran into trouble, if the story line included communists. One positive aspect was the cold war cinema films of the McCarthy era were banned in Malta. The Civil authorities went into hysteria at the word communist. The then regular Christmas tournament, organized by the Malta Football Association was stopped, because most the teams invited came from Eastern Europe. The catholic oligarchy led by the now Sir Michael Gonzi Archbishop of Malta with its’ network of Parish priests spying on each and every individual in each respective parish operating in a Gestapo fashion. The Main employment on the island depended on the Naval Dockyard, and on the other British Military Bases. The contradiction here was that, to declare oneself Communist would have been sheer madness, as these "devout" Catholics, would have starved you to death, while on the other hand Marxist Ideas spread amongst progressive workers, by the odd English Airmen or Sailors posted on the island.

In the last days of the Catholic hierarchy imposed Dr George Borg Olivier Nationalist administration, as in 1962 and 1966 general elections the church again made use of moral sanctions, now to safeguard its privileges it enjoyed during the colonial period, The Communist party was eventually set up, through the activism of Paul Agius who had returned to Malta, from Australia, who along with other Maltese comrades founded the Communist Party of Malta This event took place around 1969. The party for a short period operated underground but after 1971 when the Borg Olivier administration was finally defeated The Party came out into the open. The Party Membership started to grow Lillian Schiberras Anthony Vassallo, Anthony Baldachinno and others. Evarist Bartolo, Mario Vella, and Alfred Consiglio were amongst the early members
It is not possible to mention all here but many passed through party membership. During the 1970,s the party gave critical support from the left to the Dom Mintoff’s Labour Party administration progressive, anti imperialist policy. The Party supported the policy of neutrality and the demilitarization of Malta, At the time Malta was an important NATO Base. The Communist Party was not prepared to contest the General Elections in 1976 and in 1979 was in support of the closing down of all the military bases in Malta. In 1981.for various reasons, again the party could not contest in the general elections. During the 1980's the party embarked on the road towards electoral campaigns. The party started to publish a monthly newspaper "Zminijietna" and started to prepare for the evantuality of contesting. The Party was now going through its golden age as membership started to grow and things were looking up. On the eve of the 1987 elections Dom Mintoff now a backbencher in the Labour administration proposed amendments to the Maltese constitution, which were accepted unanimously. The electoral rules were changed to suit the two party system and it resulted that small parties now had no chance of surmounting the unofficial 17% threshold. The Central Committee failed to read the writing on the wall. Failed to withdraw from the fray, and contested the 1987 elections with disastrous results. After this debacle, the party went into a period of decline. The events in Eastern Europe of 1989 continued to give the party further blows, where now it was a struggle to survive and keep its archives.
In the mid 1990’s the party slowly started again on the road of being active once again.
NEWS FROM FRATERNAL PARTIES
Communist Festival in Copenhagen, Denmark
A Festival jointly organised by the Communist Party in Denmark (KPiD) and the Communist Party of Denmark (DKP) takes place on Saturday 15. August (12-23) and Sunday 16. August (12-18) in Norrebroparken in Copenhagen (near Nordbanegade). Bus 5A from Central Train Station. Lots of music, speakers from the 2 organising parties and from other organisations, political debates, displays, food, drinks and happiness - everything in favour of the 2 communist papers, Kommunist and Skub.
Everybody visiting Copenhagen are invited!

LINKS
http://www.icsbrussels.org/ICS/2009/Sci09_Available_Papers.htm
http://cubaveritas.blogspot.com/

http://www.havanatimes.org/?p=14368

http://wwwlavienglish.blogspot.com/2010/10/soviet-union-was-born-in-october-1917.html

http://aucpbenglishwebsite.blogspot.com/

http://inter.kke.gr/en/articles/Statement-of-77-Communist-and-Workers-Parties-against-the-Imperialist-Military-Attack-against-Syria/

http://communismgr.blogspot.com.mt

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