SECOND SETBACK FOR THE RICHT
_by A. UDRY gola. He wanted to reassure a part of Portuguese (and international) finance capital (which is strongly interested in the rich regions of Angola) and to hold back the process of decolonization. After all, on the same day he received a delegation of "Ango lan personalities" headed by Francisco Lele, leader of the "Angolan Democratic party, " who declared at the end of the interview: "Once again, the President has just saved Angola." He had done the same thing in July, when he received Mme. Joana Siméno, who explained the "dangers FRELIMO represented for Mozambique. " And he met with Mobutu to discuss the settlement of the Angolan affair. Concurrently, many far-right parties emerged out of these initatives, calling themselves things like Progress party, Liberal party, National party. On September 19 posters started appeering showing a square-jawed, bespectacled young execufive-type with the words "Silent majority" written ocross the mouth. The posters called for a demonstration to support the president of the republic. A convergence was established between the bourgeois sectors that had taken part in the April 25 military coup (whether happily or not), like Champalimaud, Galvoo de Melo, Spínola, etc., and the far-right sectors linked to the Legion, to the most determined colonialists, like Casal Ribeiro, Franco Nogueiro, Kaulza de Arriago. Within the "Junta of National Salvation" itself, elements like Galvao de Melo and Sanches Osorio (the minister of information) declared themselves in favor of the demonstration. Sanches Osorio wos to issue a radio communiqué asking that the "pickets" and "barricades" set up around Lisbon on September 27 be taken down. Within the army, Spinola's project was supported by not negligible sectors, including, among others, the paratroopers of Tanços. The right and the for right were mobilizing. Right-wing "banquets" were flourishing. On September 25 they took place in Campo Pequeno, the "plaça de toros" of Lisbon. The anticommunist campaign was developing. Those sectors most closely fied to American capital and to sections of Brazilian capital, which are the sectors most attoched to colonial exploitation, were supporting this offensive of the right and the for right. Here it must be stressed that in fact the policy of the gover ment and the Armed Forces Movement (AFM) was permitting these currents to ocquire the room they needed to reorganize themselves. The intervention of the armed forces against the striking workers of the Jornal da Comercio, wha ing the removal of Carlos Machodo, the fascist director, ogainst the workers of Lisnave, who were demanding a dee ing of the purge of foscist elements, combined loste the various maneuvers of the for right. This was all the nore
true in that the government proved to be very understanding toward the demands of the ex-PIDE (secret police) agents -Galvao de Melo received a delegation of them -- and did not hide the financial support that these various groups were enjoying. The far-right organizations, with the support of a good part of the church in the North of the country, sought a social base among certain pelty-bourgeois and peasant layers of the North, of Alentejo. But things had changed. Today, the peasantry no longer represents a decisive and sufficient support or important social base booking the maneuvers of reaction. The response Confronted with this vast far-right maneuver, the mobilization of the workers and youth developed and intensified, beginning on September 27. The counteroffensive really took hold on that afternoon; barricades were raised, the roads leading into Lisbon were controlled. The AFM did not intervene directly; the internal divisions restricted its possibilities of taking immediate initiatives. The response to reaction's assault had a twofold dimension. On the one hand, the mobilization of the masses was far from negligible; on the other hand, during the second phase, the outcome of the confrontation was determined by the intervention of the Armed Forces Movement. There is no doubt that Spínola and the various circles that were part of the operation drew book at the moment when the relationship of forces within the AFM and between the AFM and the whole army clearly appeared to be favoring the centrist and left-centrist wing of the AFM. An open division in the army, with all that would imply in Portugal under the present situation, was possible if the test of strength had been prolonged. That certainly mode the Spinolish think twice. But while it is incontestable that the relationship of forces within the AFM and between the AFM and the army and the eventual intervention of the AFM were decisive elements determining the result of the confrontation, if is also quite clear that the mobilizations of the workers and youth and the appeals of the Trade Union Federation, the CP, and the for left played an important role in the decisions that were made by the AFM. Moreover, the experience acquired by a section of the working class in this test of strength must not be underestimated. The refusal of typographers to print advertisements for the "silent majority" demonstration and the strike of the railway and streetcar workers remain important elements that can serve to concretize the for-left's propaganda around the theme of antifascist struggle. It should also be noted that some soldiers participated in building the barricodes against the orders of some officers, that is, before the official appeal was launched by the AFM. Nevertheless, a distinction has to be made between the mobilization on the one hand and the degree of politicization, the readiness of brood sectors of the Portuguese working class to intervene in the battle as an independent political factor, on the other hand. This weakness explains both the ability of the AFM to regain control of the situation and the limits of the crisis that followed the fall of Spinola. It is here that one can see the differences between the development of consciousness among the Italian, Spanish, or French workers and the Portuguese workers. In Italy, Spain, or France such a confrontation, the failure of a maneuver like Spinola's, would have touched off a crisis of great breadth. This factor must not be overlooked. It allows for an understanding of the foot that despite the extreme institutional weakness of the bourgeois regime, the situation still remains what it is today; so much so that the immediate results of the events of September 27-29 appear to be the establishment of the "Sundays of national
"the voluntary Sunday work programs. The weak level of politicization results from the weight of forty years of fascism, the fragmentation of the working class, the nonexistence of a mobilization on a national scale, and the persistence of democratic illusions. It is exactly becouse of all this that the Portuguese Communist party is able to maintain the hegemony it holds over the working class. At the same time, however, that hegemony reinforces these illusions. Thus, the CP was a not unimportant factor in the credibility Spínola had acquired, and in this sense, the CP contributed to facilitating the Bonapartist operations of the butcher of Guinea-Bissau. In the same manner, the CP today is placing a halo around the heads of the AFM. Ever since September 29, it has been relegating the role played by the workers mobilizotions in checking Spinola's operation almost to parenthetical remarks; the main light is shined on the function of the AFM as the only "guarantor of democracy. " Consequently, the AFM has come out of the crisis as one of the main winners. In the present institutional crisis of the Portuguese bourgeoisie, the function as hinge of power for the bourgeoisie that the AFM is playing tends to be very much hidden by the policy of the reformist parties and even by some of the centrist currents. Aftermath of the crisis While the fall of Spinola did not lead to an explosion of great scope, it is no less the cose that the crisis and the instability can only be prolonged. On the economic level, inflation is rising rapidly. It has now reached the rate of 33 percent a year. Unemployment is growing at an accelerated rate and is being intensified still more by the return to Partugal of immigrant workers driven out of other European countries by restricfive megsures and by the return of the "small whites" and the soldiers from the "African provinces. " The flight of capital is still expanding. On this field, the government's concessions can only be strictly limited. Gonçalves has already proven this by raising the prices of bosic necessities. In his October 6 speech in Porto he declared: "Today, to be impatient is to be a fascist. We are now working ouf democratic laws, and the people must help us to strengthen our democratic conquests. ... The task will not be easy, for Portugal is at the tail and of Europe. The people must be aware of our limitations. We cannot have a guaranteed minimum wage like in France or Germany. " (Le Figaro, October 10, 1974.) The institutional vacuum is odded to this objectively narrow maneuvering room on the economic field. And this is the situation during the approach of elections. Finally, the decolonization process is not over in Angola. Becausc of the size of the white colonial population, the divisions within the liberation movements, and the riches of its subsoil, Angola poses more complicated problems for the provisional government than did Guinea-Bissau and Mozambique. Decisive sectors of the bourgeoisie have tried twice -- in Luly and in September -- to avoid the coming electoral test by corrying out presidential and plebiscitary operations. Both attempts failed, For the CP and the SP, all compromises are permissible, provided they allow for the achieving of the objective that appears as the justification for their whole policy: the "free elections" to a constituent assembly in March 1975. Any efforts by important sectors of the bourgeoisie to postpone these elections to an indefinite date will be very difficult for the CP and the SP to accept. But nothing was settled on this matter after September 27-29. The time the bourgeoisie had to get ready for the elections or lounch an offensive to regain more solid control prevented either of the two projects from bearing any fruit. The right seems dispersed after the fall of Spinola. Given the current relationship of forces, its only alternative is to rally around
9
PORTUGAL a center or left-center formation like the PPD (People's Democratic party, the party of Sd Corneiro). But this party does not have a very broad influence; its presence in political life is limited, even though it does participate in the provisional government along with the AFM, the CP, and the SP. Its ability to respond to the influence of the CP on the electoral field is more than limited. According to many Portuguese journalists, the CP could receive 20 percent of the vote or more. In this context, the function of the AFM appears more clear than ever. To be sure, it is not a homogeneous movement; various tendencies coexist within it, although the center and center-left were strengthened by the September 27-29 events. Moreover, Costa Gomes represents a link with the sectors of the army that are now coming into conflict with the AFM. Nevertheless, substantially, this movement represents the key prop of the regime of a bourgeoisie suffering an extreme crisis of political leadership and a crying lack of an instrument to work with in the traditional framework of bourgeois democracy -Vasco Gongalves. There were many calls for national unity and even homage to Spinole, "this former comrade in arms and vigilance. In the course of several interviews before and after the end of September, Conçalves clearly indicated the character of the program of the AFM. On this point, there are many in the most enlightened bourgeois circles who are not kidding themselves. Thus, the prime minister declared: "The program of the Armed Forces Movement involves no basic reforms and no substantial changes in the socioeconomic system under which we are living." (Le Monde, October 1, 1974). The priority tasks in Portugal today are: "to do a lot of work, and it is essential that cooperation among all the workers be total. 1 am speoking not only of the workers of the factories and fields, but also those of the offices, the managers, the investors. There is no doubt that we have to deal with the three problems (unemployment, inflation, unutilized land), but we will have to face others too: economic development and foreign investment. " (Nouvel Observateur, October 7.) These choices by the AFM had already become clear when it passed its antistrike legislation, which ban all political strikes, occupations, solidarity strikes, and isolated and sectional work stoppages that block production; it also requires seven days' notice before beginning a strike, which cannot begin any sooner than thirty days after presentation of the list of demands. At the time this legislation was passed, a reporter from the Financial Times, the main organ of British capitalism, wrote: "But the presence in the government of officers of the Movement of the Armed Forces undoubtedly gives the cabinet more authority They have contributed to the successful promulgation of legislation. " (August 29.) 10
The army's intervention against strikes and the measures taken against the far left expose the essential function of the Armed
Forces Movement better than a thousand speeches. Neverthelass, it remaine true that this movement is not a monolithic one; various political trends work in it, and this enables it to manifest attitudes on certain occasions allowing it to coopt a moss movement whose politicization is meager.
On October 2, to close the crisis, the Confederation of Portuguese Industry affirmed in a telegram sent to Goncalves and then mode public that the confederation would back him, especially since the brigodier prime minister had manifested areat responsibility" in various speeches given since the fall of Spinola. That support is clear proof that in the present situation the bourgeoisie considers the AFM as the backbone, even if a weak one, of is rule. The Portuguese Communist party was also strengthened by this first confrontation. The CP -- along with the Trade Union Federation, which now claims some 2 million members -- appeared as capable of mobilizing considerable forces and of being a determining factor in "blocking reaction. " This will most likely contribute to consolidating the CP's position among broad sectors of the working mosses and to covering up it policy of rotten compromise, it will also probably strengthen the CP's position relative to the for left. One of the CP leaders affirmed: "Whatever may be thought by the reactionaries, who are surprised at our strength, we have no intention of imposing a Popular Front government." (Express, October 7-13.) In fact, the CP's policy of national union implies throwing the maximum weight to the role of the AFM. In the present situation, the bourgeoisie, which still faces the March 1975 deadline, might well try some new manouvers. In the event of a major crisis, one of the bourgeoisie's opriors could be a presidential operation this time launched by the AFM itself, by this "guarantor of democracy, " as the CP calls it. The CP would then hove some difficulties making the tom. In any case, however, the instability will certainly persist, without this implying that sharp turrs are impossible. The politicization of the workers -- through strikes and demonstrafions like those at TAP (the Portuguese air lines), Lisnave (shipyards), and the barricades of the afternoon and evening of September 27 -- will continue to develop. It is more than likely that the real confrontations, the mobilizations that will open the road to a political intervention on a new level by broad sectors of the working class, will develop in a future phase. in this sense, the intervention of revolutionary Marxists in the counteroffensive ogainst reaction, in the trade unions and the workers struggles, in systematically denouncing the CP's strategic project, and in the central political question (the question of the government) will be an important element in assuring the victory of the working class. I