Maite Mola: “The Europe of the workers has to raise its voice against the Europe of the markets”

The past Saturday on November the 10th the Party of the European Left (EL), represented by its vice-president Maite Mola, participated in an international meeting in Madrid, organized by the Communist Party of Spain (Partido Comunista de Espana - PCE), supporting the general strike of the 14-N. The previous day she also gave a press conference in the north of the country – in Navarra – together with the regional coordinator of the United Left (Izquierda Unida – IU) José Miguel Nuin.

In both events Maite Mola underlined the importance that for the first time the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) calls for a general strike, demonstrations and mobilisation on a European level, and that for the first time as well a left Political force on a European level, a European left party decisively supports a united strike against the politics of austerity and cuts in the same way that the party already has been striving for years.

The vice-president of the EL denounced that every European Summit marks a new phase of austerity and of the confiscation of power away from the national Parliaments, who in turn are each and every time more limited in their power to decide on the development of their own general state budgets. She also warned on the menace planned through the announced European banking union, which will inflict a new attack on the salaries, on the pensions and on the social protection system as a whole.

The vice-president denounced the third memorandum imposed by the Troika and approved these days in Greece, which deepens the impoverishment of the people. She criticized the destruction of the industry and the materials of production and warned about the growing recession, threatening all countries of the Eurozone, which at the same time increases the public debt in connection with the growing unemployment and inequalities would lead to the end of the European Union.

Together with the weakening of democracy Mola warned of the rising of national and regional chauvinism but also of the dangerous advance of nazism and fascism – xenophobic forces which are growing in these situations of crisis. A reflex is the intent of criminalizing communism equating it to nazism. She put forward the example of Moldavia where the use of the sickle and hammer symbol has been prohibited.

In this context, the vice-president of the EL explained that the 14-N promises to be something special, not only because of its European character but because of the confluence of the social movements, the political parties and the trade unions. Additionally, she called for the unity in coordination: “It’s not the moment to criticise, but to unite ourselves in order to solve the problem that people in hunger. We have to work from within the institutions, from within Europe and from within the social movements. In the EL we have proposals against the austerity, against the dependency on financial markets, in favour of the rebirth of democracy as well as in favour of peace, the rejection of domination and the submission of the NATO. 

Maite Mola concluded clearly, saying that “the EL will support the actions of the 14-N, because the Europe of the workers has to raise its voice against the Europe of the markets, created by the conservatives, the liberals and the social democrats who have led us into this situation”, and asked everyone to go out on the Street the 14-N, ”for the workers, for another Europe that should be an Europe of social rights and of the peoples”.

In the international meeting held in Madrid, also the two leaders of the youth of Syriza participated, who told about how Greece is being experimented with on the question of how far the liberal capitalism could go and how the guinea pig, which are the Greek people, were freed. They have talked about how the country is being destroyed, with cuts of 40% - 60% of the salaries and pensions, with an unemployment rate of 25% and 150.000 of the youth which had to leave from a country where youth unemployment of over 50% and increase of suicides out of despair. Nikos Alex Isychos and Vyron Vasiliabis warned that at the beginning they had been told that they should not worry as “Greece would not be Argentina and that we are European. And now they are telling you the same, that you shouldn’t worry, as Spain would not be Greece”. The young Greeks talked on the 29 general strikes that were carried out in the country, of the crumbling of two governments and how they celebrate the international fight “against international capitalism and its internal and external henchmen”.

The host of the event, the Secretary-General of the Spanish Communist Party and a national MP for the United Left Party José Luis Centella, went directly to the very root source the situation leading to the general strike of 14-N: “They will not cut us a nip of our salary. What they want is to finish off the working class… and also with the trade unions and with the political parties that are the instruments of struggle of the working class”.
Centella explained that was had been happening in this country has been a “plundering”. “They have exploited the economy. And we single point out to the guilty who are still intending to benefit from the crisis at the expense of the workers”, and added that, “the stakeholders and the Banks could not have made this fraud without an accomplice government” who permitted them to do it.

Party of the European Left, 13.11.2012

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