Following,
we transcribe an article from Bolpress that reproduces the declaration of the
Agrupación Marxista Revolucionaria (AMR - Revolutionary
Marxist Group) from Bolivia published facing the foundation of the Instrumento
Político de los Trabajadores (IPT – Workers’ Political Tool), voted during the
last Congress of the Central Obrera Boliviana (COB - Workers´ General Union of
Bolivia). The declaration can be read in its original version in AMR’s blog: http://amr-bolivia.blogspot.com.ar/2013/02/pronunciamiento-de-la-agrupacion.html.
The
Tendencia Piquetera Revolucionaria (TPR) is supporting politically and
practically at this moment the struggle that the comrades are developing in
order to build a tendency to fight for a truly revolutionary, proletarian,
anti-imperialist, democratic and mass-bassed IPT, and we call all Latin-American
and world-wide left parties, CRFI in the first place, to militate in this same
sense.
Let´s
build a revolutionary, anti-imperialist, democratic and mass-based proletarian
block
FOR A INSTRUMENTO POLÍTICO DE LOS TRABAJADORES (WORKERS´
POLITICAL TOOL), NO CONFIDENCE ON THE BUREACRACY
The Central
Obrera Boliviana (COB) [workers´ general union of Bolivia, TN] is discussing
the creation of the Instrumento Político
de los Trabajadores (IPT) [Workers´ Political Tool, TN], or Workers´ Party.
The creation of the IPT is an expression of the sharpening of class struggle
and a progressive masses rupture with the indigenous nationalism.
The creation of
the IPT is part of a continental process, where there is a tendency of the
working class to break with the bourgeois and petit-bourgeois nationalist
governments, because of their exhaustion (“right-wing turn”) and commitments
with imperialism. In the Bolivian case, it takes place in the framework of a new
political period: Evo Morales´ government and the MAS tried to implement a “gasolinazo” (raise of fuel prices),
resisted and defeated by the workers of the COB. After that, the government
attacked the native people of TIPNIS, willing to impose IIRSA´s project (the
building of a freeway through the Bolivian Amazonia), producing the rupture of
2 of the 5 peasants unions with the government and its “Andean capitalism”
project (CIDOB and CONAMAQ).
Others events
were added to this, as the fight of the industrial workers against the Labor
Code and for wage rise; the longest strike of doctors, nurses and health sector
against the lengthening of the working day (from 6 to 8 hours); and the
enormous struggle of Colquiri mining workers, who, led by Severino Estallani,
fought against the cooperatives allied to the MAS in order to achieve
nationalization of all the mine (fight that cost the life of the comrade Victor
Choque, who was murdered by the capitalists and with full complicity of the
MAS).
But the main
reason for the REAL creation of the IPT was the relative move away of Trujillo
and Perez´s bureaucracy from the official party apparatus of the MAS. They are
failing in theirs attempt to achieve better conditions to the COB bureaucracy,
and also in getting places in the electoral roll. So it´s not that the most combative
sections of the COB are leading the creation of the IPT, but that who lead are
those who were elected with the support of Evo Morales and the MAS. It should
be enough to remember the XV COB Congress in Tarija, where Trujillo was elected
with the help of the MAS (as Miguel Perez in the FSTMB [Bolivian Mining Workers
Federation, TN]). They called the 1st Workers´ Union-Political
Conference developed in Cochabamba on January 17th and 18th
and now they are calling to the First IPT Congress in February 21st
and 22nd in Huanuni (the biggest mining workers concentration, with
more than 4000 workers).
The documents and the discussion in the COB’s
Political Committee
In the meetings
of the COB’s Political Committee, a principles declaration, a government
program and a statute were discussed, without any democratic discussion before
the IPT Conference in Cochabamba. That’s why a lot of members of the IPT
Conference questioned those documents. Also the way the debate was organized
was put into question. It seemed that Trujillo didn´t read the Political
Committee document, considering it as a secondary problem, and relied on the
three mayor members of the Committee: Jaime Solares, leader of the bureaucracy
historically opposed to the MAS; Montoya, Trujillo´s political operator in the
Committee; and Javo Ferreira, leader of the LOR-CI [FT-CI, TN]. Thirty days
were assigned to discuss the documents.
It remains
fresh the order (several times repeated) said by Trujillo and Perez about the
necessity of “maintaining the IPT independent from the unions”: that is, IPT
may be independent of the COB. This order, in today´s scenery, is mainly
against Solares. But also offers the perspective of transform the IPT in a party
with the shape of bourgeois professionals which, although directed by
bureaucrats, hasn´t organic relation with the masses of the COB (so not render
of account to the COB, the Federations and unions is needed). This is a way to
limit the participation of the working class and enclose it in the economic
activity. Revolutionaries have always fought against tendencies that defend the
autonomy of trade-union movement from the party.
Is Solares the left-wing in the COB?
Jaime Solares,
cultural advisor of the COB and member of its National Executive Committee,
states that “our aim is to govern, but if we cannot, at least we will be the
second force” (this is based on the fact that COB has 2 million workers
associated). He spoke attacking Evo Morales government and the MAS, he talked
about an IPT “grass-rooted”, about “socialism” and about “political power for
workers”. Solares´ statement avoid, as the Political Committee document, the
destruction of the bourgeois State and the Proletarian Dictatorship, that is,
the organization of the workers as dominant class through the leadership of a
Revolutionary Party. His aim is to use the IPT in order to become a Bolivian
Lula, and as long as he couldn´t, focuses on parliamentary cretinism, opposite
to use MPs as a proletarian revolutionary tribunes.
Solares wants
to use these clashes with Trujillo and Perez in order to make the left believe
that it’s with him that an overcoming project can be developed. But neither he
publicly delimitates from the other bureaucratic block nor propose alternative
documents. Therefore, his calls to the left to get support against Trujillo and
Perez are a farce. If Solares wanted to break with Trujillo and Perez, he should
do it explicitly and, thus, call the left to support him. But this is not
happening: Solares aim is to be a Bolivian Lula with the left as a mere puppet.
Those who follow him will integrate him, or will be used and cheated, as in
2009 Solares abandoned the common candidature in COB with the left, because he
didn´t want to confront with Evo Morales.
The big danger: IPT could transform itself in
an anti-workers and parliamentarist freak which serves bourgeois parties
In these
conditions, the IPT, which raises so many expectations in many sectors of
workers (mainly mining workers), could transform itself in an anti-workers and
parliamentarist freak which serves bourgeois parties. As well as Trujillo and
Perez, MAS allies in the COB, finally decided to build the IPT in order to maneuver
in their own interest; also the MAS, directly and through PCB, PCML and different
sectors of the bureaucracy, are doing an effort to show that IPT can be a
complement to the MAS. The call of the bureaucracy of Trujillo and Perez, after
the Enlarged Committee in Sucre (On January 23rd and 24th),
to build a “parliamentary workers’ brigade” (El Cambio, January 25th), is construed by bureaucrats of
the MAS as a chance to get into the parliament to vote with the MAS. In this
sense, “the regional chief of the MAS, Leonilda Zurita –historical leader of cocalero movement [peasants that
cultivate coke leaf, TN]-, said the creation of COB´s party wouldn´t affect the
government, but reinforce social organizations” (La Opinion, January 1st).
And as long as
they cannot achieve this, they will try to delay everything in order to prevent
IPT from running for the elections in 2014. The bureaucracy of oil union, as a
case, was with the electricity union one next to Evo Morales in the
Plurinational State day and it´s one the more masist wings of the COB
bureaucracy. “El Cambio” [masist bolivian
newspaper, TN], published an article based on declarations of Hugo Gonzalez
(oil union leader) where he state that the creation of IPT “´isn´t from one day
to another because a lot of things have to be considered, as the ideological
definition” (January 26th).
From the AMR we
repudiate these statements and we maintain that this delaying attempt has to be
denounced, as every attempt to transform workers deputies into MAS tail-list.
We must have revolutionary workers deputies and a revolutionary candidature to
the Presidency to confront politically with masism (the new right) and also the
old right. As AMR, as well as we reject parliamentarian electoralism, we reject
every maneuver to prevent IPT running for the elections in 2014 because we are
enemies of the anti-parliamentarian cretinism and abstention which will only favor
the MAS. The fact that documents aren´t revolutionary or that the discussion
isn´t being democratized cannot be, in our opinion, an excuse to prevent IPT’s
existence and strengthening because we know that in many cases are the MAS
political operators themselves who guarantee documents are not revolutionaries
and discussion is not democratized: the MAS wants to prevent the possibility of
a worker candidature at the left of the government, because it would show the anti-workers
and anti-popular government´s turn.
The Bolivian left and the IPT: sectarianism
and opportunism
The Enlarged
Committee in Sucre decided to call immediately the IPT Foundational Congress on
February 21st (in the mining district Huanuni). Facing this, the
Bolivian left is dissolved, confused and adapted, depending on the case.
The POR: a sectarian pose opposite to its own
tradition and in favor of the MAS
The POR hadn´t objection
in using the accurate posing about the necessity to fight for the destruction of
the bourgeois State and the necessity of the proletarian dictatorship as an
excuse to deny the necessity of the parliamentary struggle (which was exemplary
used by Bolsheviks). This leads to an objective alliance with the MAS and its
political operators, among them the bureaucracy of peasants, cocaleros, native peoples from Amazonia
and Kollasuyo, teachers and bartolinas
[womenpeasants’ organization, TN].
The struggle of
revolutionaries is not turning away from IPT, but over and inside it, posing
the necessity of a real revolutionary program in order to make the COB adapt a
class perspective, against bureaucracy. On the contrary, POR militants abandon what,
according to “MASAS” [the newspaper of POR], they defend: Pulacayo Thesis, the
experience of the Workers Parliamentary Block, the Popular Assembly in 1971 and
FRA [Anti-imperialist Revolutionary Front, TN]. They will turn away their own
experience developed by POR in the 70´s in Brazil, when as part of the Fourth
International Tendency (TCI) with Argentinian PO, they promoted the fight of
Causa Operaria (today Partido do Causa Operaria, PCO) for a revolutionary, proletarian,
anti-imperialist, democratic and mass-based PT. Atilio da Costa, leader of the
CERCI (Latin-American organization leaded by Bolivian POR), was part of this
struggle. The militancy of POR cannot accept that its organization, with an
historical tradition in Bolivian history, adopts the false opposition POR vs
IPT, as the current situation offers the POR a historical opportunity to fight
for the revolutionary program.
We call the
Study Center “Cesar Lora” and every militant cell, regional committee or leader
of POR to oppose the sectarianism of the leadership of POR (sectarianism that
makes a favor to the MAS), to achieve POR’s break with the OBJECTIVE block with
the government and participation in the IPT Foundational Congress in order to
fight for a Platform for a revolutionary, proletarian, anti-imperialist,
democratic and mass-based IPT. Otherwise they will continue adapted to a party
bureaucracy that has treated the strategy and tactic of the working class.
Lambertism, the ASR and different morenoists:
complete adaptation to the COB bureaucracy
Different
currents of the international Trotskyism with big or little influence in our
country, as lambertism, the current of Peter Taëffe (Alternativa Socialista Revolucionaria,
ARS –from Cochabamba-) and variants of morenoism, as UIT-CI represented by
Miguel Lamas, member of La Protesta and APR (Alternativa Popular
Revolucionaria) have saluted without any delimitation of the bureaucracy the
initiative of the IPT. Doing this they contribute to a Bolivian version of
Lulism. In the same field are Lucha Socialista (LIT-CI) and MST, expelled from the
LIT. It´s not casual: all these organizations had supported the adaptation
inside Brazilian PT, as they deny the necessity of posing a program. That´s why
they tend to join with the bureaucracy in the COB, which changed the original
proposal about the name of the party (Frente de la Revolución Social,
[Revolutionary Social Front, TN]) to PT, in reference to the tragic Brazilian
experience, where a bureaucrat (Lula) originally opposed to the dictatorship
ended governing on behalf of the imperialism. Neither lambertism nor ASR can
coherently explain how they change from supporting (with some critics) the
nationalist petit-bourgeois program of the MAS to support the perspective if
the IPT.
LOR-CI is seeking a place in the leadership
of the IPT without fighting vigorously against both sectors of the bureaucracy
The LOR-CI,
which was put in an important place because of its participation in the
Political Committee, didn´t intervene in the Conference of Cochabamba against
the poses of both sectors of the bureaucracy. On the opposite, it only claims
the abstraction of “an IPT without capitalists, landlords nor bankers”. This is
explained because of the (real) fear to be excluded of the Political Committee.
But this participation can never be defended with silence, but it has to be
done reinforcing the denounce of the positions of the bureaucracy in conflict,
and building the IPT really from the bases (as some time ago the LOR-CI
denounced the bureaucracy didn´t do). The current policy of the LOR-CI seeks a
tactical agreement with the bureaucracy in order to get into the leadership of
the IPT, that is, a centrist and opportunist policy. The AMR will defend them
if any attempt to expulse Javo Ferreira of the Political Committee occurs (as
we defend the largest democracy inside COB and the future IPT).
The AMR calls to the formation of a Block to
fight for a revolutionary, proletarian, anti-imperialist, democratic and
mass-based IPT
The AMR calls
the workers, students, peasants, their organizations and fighters and all the
left in Bolivia to break with any expectation in Evo Morales´ government and
the MAS and develop a struggle for a revolutionary, anti-imperialist,
proletarian, democratic and mass-based Instrumento
Político de los Trabajadores. We are facing an event quite important
worldwide and in particular in Latin-America. That´s why we accept the
collaboration of the Tendencia Piquetera Revolucionaria (TPR) from Argentina in
the fight for this Platform (despite of our differences on the vote for Evo
Morales in 2005 and the Constituent Assembly in 2007), and we think that also
the Coordinating Committee of the IV International (CRFI) has to join us in
this political struggle, widely discussing and collaborating.
Some
organizations are doubtful, paralyzed or in crisis on this point. Somehow it´s
natural, but working class demands definitions. As revolutionary Marxists, we
do believe that what we are facing is a kind of centrist bureaucracy because we
saw them against class struggle (as in the fight for the 100% nationalization
of Colquiri), but at the same time they are stepping towards the formal
organization of a workers´ party separated from the bourgeoisie and its State
(even if it´s formally). In these sense, we know that IPT isn´t and it won’t be
the Workers´ Party the Bolivian proletarian needs, but we won’t stay outside to
critic without fighting for this goal, because that pose is for charlatans and
not for revolutionaries. It would be useless to wait the fail or cooptation of
the IPT by the bourgeoisie and imperialism in order to then state that ´we were
right´. Marxist tradition calls to support any initiative that is a first step towards
the political differentiation of workers from owners (as it´s seen in the
statements of Lenin and Trotsky regarding the English Labor Party). The only
Workers Party is the revolutionary one, but an IPT, as it´s separated from the
bourgeoisie, is a step forward, where we will promote the discussion to enlighten
the workers vanguard. In this sense we call Agenda Revolucionaria, Tesis 11,
Patria Insurgente and all the organizations that claim themselves part of the
popular and workers struggle to set position in order to join this fight. The
little or big possibilities we can have to intervene and transform the IPT in a
revolutionary party cannot be wasted. We have to give the IPT a revolutionary
content and perspective: we have to claim ourselves an alternative and group
AGAINST the bureaucracy, building a tendency inside IPT.
Because of
this, as AMR we will combat for an IPT organically linked with the COB bases, which
allows the most enlarged freedom of tendencies, and we will be strongly
opposite to the reactionary perspectives of the bureaucracy:
1) A
revolutionary IPT, because it´s the only way to be really independent of the
bourgeoisie and the capitalist state.
2) An
anti-imperialist IPT, because the working class has to channel the united front
to lead the Bolivian oppressed nation in its fight for the definitive
emancipation.
3) A
proletarian IPT, because it has to be the tool of the COB and, therefore, be
under the control and decisions of its bases, opposite to any idea about an IPT
“not linked to the COB”.
4) A democratic
IPT, because any ´centralist´ obstacle would be a favor to the bureaucracy
against the most consequent tendencies (as Alvaro Linera applies this concept
in the MAS).
5) A mass-based
IPT, because we have to fill the new party with workers as much as possible, in
order to strengthen the independent political movement of our class, to give
the word to the more exploited and radical sectors and to oppose to any
´vanguard´ concept, which in the hands of the bureaucracy would be used to
build a democratizing and front-populist ´cadres party´.
As it is
written in the COB´s flag, “the workers emancipation will be the task of the
workers themselves”. To achieve that, the AMR compromises itself with this
fight until the end, and we consider our fight in the IPT as part as the
struggle for the Workers Party and the IV International. The only way of
proletarian political independence is the revolutionary party, in order to
overcome the chains of men by men exploitation and the imperialist oppression
of Bolivia, Latin-America an all around the world. Let´s develop, as well as
the economic struggle, the political and ideological one.
February 7th, 2013
Agrupación
Marxista Revolucionaria
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