AGRARIAN REFORM
By Henri Dumoulin
- The. self~managed agricultural sector in Algeria today in+« ' cludes the best land in the. country, the areas formerly occupied by. the European colons, some 5,000,000 hectares [one hectare = 2,47 | acres], ‘Aside from. oil, it constitutes the principal resource, not only of agriculture but of the national economy as a whole, But .the sale of its products, strongly oriented toward export, still remains subject to the capitalist markets, above all France, In addition, providing employment for around 200, 000 permanent workers, who. gain approximately 7,5 dinars a.day [one dinar = about $.20 Ue S. ], it furnishes a livelihood for about 1,000,000 to 1,500,000 persons,
The self-managed industrial sector, although still quite minor in relation to the private sector, is nevertheless of great importance, above all as an example and as an extremely valuable school for revolutionary militants, as was indicated at the Congress of Workers of this sector of industry. [See World Outlook March 15, March 27, April 10. ] -
In the distribution of commodities, a big step forward was the setting up of a chain of Socialist Pilot: Stores, of nationalized centers of distribution, and the ‘launching of a struggle against speculators.
As against ‘these revolutionary conquests of the new Algeria, some grave problems remain to be solved,
A- dominant trait of the Algerian economy, one that is parti-
cularly hard to bring under control; is the high percentage of unemployment left over from the colonial period, in the towns as well as the countryside. It is difficult to-ascertain exact figures, "More than a million unemployed, One out of ten in the towns and a little less in the countryside." These are the most authoritative estimates,
In the countryside, in. the. mountains, undernourishment, sometimes to an extreme degree, still persists; it is particularly grave among landless peasants who may secure only_a.few days!. work a year, It also affeots the small fellahs [peasants] sweating away on two or three hectares, generally poor mountain plots from which they © scarcely gain subsistence.
In face of these still poverty~stricken masses, a more and_ more ostentatious and arrogant rising bureaucracy is appearing, visible at times in the party itself but above all in the government administrations and the state apparatus, Entrenched in red tape, cut off from the masses, enjoying already shocking wages and privileges, the bureaucrats constitute a heavy drag on the strug ggle for socialism,
These difficulties stand out against a rather somber background, ,
Women, whose seclusion was accentuated by colonialism, asa general rule are still isolated from civic life. Their servitude, registered in the mental. outlook of the men, stands in the road of liberating the community as a whole, Only the integration of women in production and their active participation throughout the national organizations. oan bring about their emancipation.
The rate-of illiteracy still remains very high, The first campaign against this scourge is but slowly getting underway. The means of speeding it up are still to be found. It requires above all active mobilization under auspices of the party, the only organization capable of arousing the necessary enthusiasm,
If the nationalists were able to utilize in a progressive way certain aspects of Islam, today amidst the social revolution, the obsourantist aspects of the Muslim religion appear more likely to constitute a brake than a liberating factor,
If possible solutions are not provided for these difficulties as a whole, the most likely outcome is a rise in the relative apathy that has been evident for some time as compared to the revolutionary enthusiasm of the months that followed the’ achievement of _ indepen~ dence,
No matter what the problems they turn to, the Algerian revolutionists are today discovering from practical experience how useful a genuine revolutionary party would be. Only such an organization can provide effective ways and means to find a road out of the current difficulties, lift the revolution out of its empiricism and, at.a local level, even improvization in which it is struggling. Such .a-party could again inspire the revolutionary enthusiasm and mobilization of the masses, a fundamental condition for new conquests,
The aim of the first congress of the Front de Libération Nationale LFLN] was precisely to lay the foundation for such a party, or rather, to readapt the former front of struggle against colonialism into a tool that can be applied to the new tasks posed by the social revolution which must now be carried out.
As the foreword of the "Charter of Algeria," the official program of the FLN which was adopted with secondary amendments , explained with great lucidity:
"The fundamental question of the exploitation of the victory and the social organization of independent Algeria, on which hinged the style of war, the alliances and the nature of the leadership, was not clearly posed at the beginning (in 1954), This original deficienoy did not prevent the insurrection, decided on by a minor~
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ity of militants, from widening, becoming consolidated, and achiev-~ ing victory. .. . One of the weaknesses of the leadership of the — FLN was not to have understood in time that the third force was a social phenomenon which had its extension within the leading bodies of the Revolution and. that this force aspired to organize Algeria in behalf of the exploiting tayers and to place the country in tow to imperialism,"
Of course, a genuinely revolutionary party could not emerge from a single congress, no matter what its importance, but today it can be hoped. that the conditions will be realized for the formation in the coming period of a great revolutionary socialist party,
Before the congress, a team existed at the top level around Ben Bella which placed all its weight in the direction of socialism; but hardly any adequate structure existed capable of helping in this task and serving as an organized connection with the masses, .
Out of the congress came. a Gentral Committee and a Political Bureau which, although far from being homogeneous, should strengthen the workers and peasants forces in the government power.
The problem for this ‘new apparatus is to find a link with the masses, It must overcome the obstacles and the brakes existing at the level of the middle cadres, in the federations, etc., which block the faithful transmission of instructions to the ranks decided on by the leadership.
_. The renewal of the party can be greatly helped by revolutionary militants working in the self-managed sector, as the Congress of Workers of the industrial sector already demonstrated.
In the best of cases, the construction of this indispensable tool will take many months, but the Revolution cannot wait, granting the time necessary for this work of rebuilding, before taking new steps forward, .
In the first weeks after Independence, the Algerian workers took over management of vast agricultural domains abandoned by the European colons [colonialists], thus beginning the agrarian reform, The decrees of March 1963 concretized and legalized these first revolutionary conquests,
In October 1963, the cycle of these first transformations culminated with the nationalization of all the holdings of the Europeans, providing what has been called the second phase of the_ agrarian reform,
Nobody can deny that it was the peasant masses who made the heaviest sacrifices in the war for national liberation, In Algeria the peasantry has constituted the great revolutionary force, The demonstrations of May.1, like the preceding popular assemblages
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which we have attended, reminded us of this once more. Again, ths rural masses coming from the douars [poor villages] to the towns, made up the leading wing of the demonstrators within which the city dwellers appeared to us more blasé, ‘seattered among the mass of fellahs,
It is necessary to draw certain conclusions from this.
Alongside the minority. directly involved in the self-managed sector, there remain perhaps 4,000,000 to 5,000,000 in the rural population, composed in the majority of. landless peasants or small fellahs, While it is true that in certain cases, in certain areas, the socialist sector is becoming a help to the small fellahs, through advances of seeds, help with agricultural machines, technical advice, etco., generally the winning of independence has not yet brought | them concretely what they fought for -- land and bread.
In his opening speech at the congress of the. party, Ben Bella
declared:
"Tt is necessary to conceive the agrarian reform as the means for more closely integrating the small landless peasants in the economic and political.life of the country. In Algeria there are still 8,500 private farms of more than 100 hectares, and 15,000 farms of more than 50 hectares, These 23,000 farms hold more than 4,500,000 heotares, while the remaining 7, 000,000 hectares are divided among 600, 000 farms.
‘two million fellahs are reduced to unemployment or to an underemployment which is close to total unemployment while most of the big proprietors visit their domains only to see if the crop is good or to collect the rent from the farmers,"
It is for these disinherited rural masses that the third phase of the agrarian reform has been conceived. its exact content has not yet been published, All that has been indicated is that the middle and big holdings belonging to Algerians are to be considerably limited. Presumably it will likewise involve a certain reshuffling, an organization of the small proprietors (feliahs)) under various forms of co-operation, ae
The draft of the agrarian reform was completed by the Council of Ministers at the beginning of April and it has been announced that it will next go to the National Assembly. It was hoped that circumstances would favor the commencement of its application with the holding of the party congress; but the latter decided that in the question of the agrarian reform it would open. . . a campaign to explain its content, .
. However, it has become urgent to carry it out. Not only to come to the aid of the disinherited masses of the countryside, but to deal a-blow to the economic strength of the middle and big Alger-
ian proprietors, These constitute a natural base of support for the obscure forces of the counterrevolution. In case the poor masses become discouraged, which cannot but help occur unless hope of finding work can be offered, the middle and big proprietors may seek to draw them behind their’ leadership in an antigovernment . adventure. It is clear that the rural bourgeoisie feels directly threatened by the nationalization measures, is ready to accept oertain risks, and is capable of envisaging a * final test of strength to beat back.the specter of agrarian reform,
‘The Revolution has reaohed a new crossroads, To win, it must deal new blows, it must take new steps forward, a
Despite appearances, a class struggle is raging under the surface in Algeria; and if the Revolution should stop at the present stage, the risk would be great that the forces of the counterrevolution, the rural proprietors, the bureaucrats, the partisans of the neocolonialist road, supported naturally by the foreign imperialist forces, would utilize the first signs of the demobilization of the masses to attack the first revolutionary conquests; that is, self-management, They would try more and more to destroy it through economic sabotage, diverting it from the socialist. direotionon to the slippery slope leading to integration into a neocolonial~ ist economy.
Thus it would seem insufficient to adopt a posture “of mere defense of the conquests already achieved, Conditions are such that any halt in the march forward can precipitate a turn highly favor able to the reaction.
That is why, along with all the other tasks placed on the order of the day at the congress of the FLN, especially the struggle against the bureaucracy, the house-cleaning, the construction of the revolutionary party, the organization of the planning of the economy, it dis necessary to place special emphasis on carrying out the third phase of the agrarian reform.
This, in: our opinion, is the surest means of opening a new wave of revolutionary conquests, the best means to keop the Revolution "going,? to safeguard it from any counterrevolutionary back-fire!
_ BIG