Pakistan: 38Congress of La Lucha. A new breakthrough in LIS
By Alejandro Bodart, MST leader and coordinator of the LIS.
I am returning from Lahore, Pakistan, where I participated in the 38th Congress of the revolutionary organization La Lucha on 13 Y 14 of March. Despite the difficulties of traveling amid the coronavirus pandemic, the visit was worth it, having achieved a new step forward in the construction of our International Socialist League. La Lucha is the main leftist organization in Pakistan. It has a national extension with presence and political weight in the various regions of the country.. Your union current, called Union Defense Campaign, brings together leaders and activists from dozens of sectors, from metallurgists and railway workers to teachers and doctors. His Revolutionary Student Front led the student rebellion of 2019 that began to recover the student centers that the Zia ul-Hac dictatorship banned in 1985. She is represented in the national parliament by her colleague Ali Wazir, leader of the Pashtoon Defense Movement who staged a real town riot last year.
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The history of Pakistan, with their 200 millions of inhabitants, It is inseparable from that of the rest of the Indian subcontinent, marked by the artificial division imposed by the British Empire. Because, The politics of La Lucha surpass the borders of the country, spanning India, Bangladesh, as well as neighbors Iran and Afghanistan. But the trip allowed us to get to know this organization on a deeper level. This is a solid and dynamic group., with young leaders and numerous cadres who build a revolutionary party and intervene in the class struggle throughout the diverse and complex Pakistani political scene, highlighting its important youth organization in the complicated occupied area of Jammu-Kashmir.
The relationship we have maintained with La Lucha since we founded the LIS had a first milestone in August 2019, when one of its main leaders, the young Imran Kamyana traveled to Türkiye to participate in the youth camp that we organized. At that time we agreed that we had important agreements on how we saw the world situation, in the need to build revolutionary parties and an international organization, and that we had to move forward in developing a political relationship and international collaboration towards the formation of a common organization. This time, We took a new very important step in that direction since our colleagues have decided to actively participate in our first World Congress to be held in September of this year..
The Congress that just concluded was, according to colleagues, the most complex of its history, and it meant the beginning of a new stage for your organization. days before its start, its founder and main leader died, Lal Khan, victim of the cancer against which he had been fighting in recent years. further, the refusal of the State to grant legal permission to hold the event until last minute and the coronavirus pandemic imposed serious obstacles. A despite everything, near 2000 companions, coming from all regions and from the farthest corners of the country, some traveling up to four days to arrive, filled the largest public auditorium in Lahore. There they dedicated the first session to Lal Kahn, highlighting its history, legacy and lessons, as well as the challenges that their absence means for the organization, his paintings and militants.
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The second session debated the international situation, in which comrade Gökçe Sentürk from the SEP of Türkiye contributed our analysis of the class struggle in the Middle East and our political work in that key region. And I shared the hectic political experience of the rise in Latin America and developed our elaboration about the changes that are taking place in the world reality, in addition to why it was necessary to group around the LIS.
The second day, The Congress debated the situation in Pakistan and the orientation of La Lucha, before voting for his national address and closing by singing The International. The next day we deepened the discussion on the LIS proposal with the recently elected Central Committee. With great joy, We confirm that we have a high degree of agreement with our colleagues on the need to advance in an international construction that overcomes the currents into which Trotskyism was divided from the post-war period to the present.. We agreed to jointly promote international campaigns and the colleagues committed to begin publishing their creations in Urdu on our website and to translate the main articles and declarations of the international into their language..
This new step, which adds to the progress we have been making in different countries and regions confirms the enormous opportunities to establish a dynamic international organization based on the elaborations and conclusions that gave rise to the LIS.. In the midst of an increasingly dynamic international situation and where capitalism shows its most monstrous face, its crisis and decline, Meeting revolutionaries who think like us from so many miles away makes us more and more optimistic and renews our strength..
Reflections by Awais Qarni, national leader of the fight
Today the new neo-fascist trend rules in Pakistan. Current Prime Minister Imran Khan is no different from Modi, Trump o Bolsonaro. In 2013, the party that represents the traditional bourgeoisie, Pakistan Muslim League (PML), won the elections. Shortly after the elections, They had problems with the "deep state" - the ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate) and other intelligence agencies- and clashed with the imperialist powers. The then prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, He negotiated with China and wanted to open trade with India. further, Saudi Arabia's butcher king Abdullah bin Salman asked Pakistan for support for his incursion into Yemen, and sharif rejected it.
The interests of the State were different from those of Sharif and the PML, Then the State took advantage of corruption and the Panama Papers to bring down Sharif and promoted the figure of Imran Khan, supported by an ISI chief named Hamid Gul, who was the architect of Afghan jihadism. Gul created Imran Khan's party, the Justice Movement (PTI), and promoted his campaign, also financed by landowner sectors and the financial bourgeoisie and supported by the State.
Imran Khan won the elections in 2018 and now he is prime minister, although the real prime minister is the head of the Armed Forces. Imran Khan cannot take a step without permission. The current State is neofascist; they censor everything, opponents imprisoned, can't disagree. But the workers, women and youth do not accept this oppression. Since Imran Khan took office, has implemented the entire IMF program. The finance minister is an IMF employee. They cut the 50% of the higher education budget, They move forward in privatizing public hospitals, the airline and the trains. The result has been devastating for workers: the economy has collapsed, there has been a strong devaluation and inflation. The Prime Minister is now called “U-turn” Khan, because he has made a u-turn in everything he said in the campaign. There is growing frustration with his government and incipient resistance, especially the students, who fight to restore student centers that have been banned since 1984. We organized protests of thousands of students against that ban in November of last year, 27 marches in 25 cities in one day, and we begin to move forward. In one province the ban has already been lifted.
The workers are also resisting. Doctors are staging major strikes against a hospital privatization law in Punjab. Teachers and health professionals protest over salaries. The struggles are scattered and not unified, but there is potential.
The national question is red hot. Pakistan, as Lenin said about Russia, It is a prison of oppressed nationalities. The Pashtoon movement that broke out these years has given energy to all movements. We have been part of it for a long time and one of its leaders, Ali Wazir, He is our companion. It is a spontaneous movement, that broke out in a region and we intervened to expand it nationally. The first mobilization of the Pashtoon Defense Movement was a great achievement (PTM) that we organize outside the province, a Lahore, in the Punjab province, considered the most oppressive nationality. After, the PTM mobilized throughout the country, and has inspired other movements and had to respond to fierce state repression. The State continually pushes the masses against the wall with its neoliberal agenda. Once there is no more space behind you, They are going to respond against the system and destroy it. There is a revolutionary trend below. It was noticed in the student movement, who raised slogans such as "Asia is going to be red" and "the voices of 69 "they will ring again".
The Fight intervenes through its fronts. The Union Defense Campaign (PTUDC) that we promote and coordinate various union struggles, It has an important impact on many unions. Brings together leaders and activists of steel unions, railway, electrical, and a group has joined our organization, of health, among others. We fight against privatization, We demand that the minimum wage be equal to 12 grams of gold, who were worth less than the minimum wage in 2003, while now the minimum wage is 17.500 Roopies and the 12 grams of gold 60 a 70.000. Our Revolutionary Student Front spearheaded the formation of a national Student Action Committee with 17 organizations that coordinated the mobilizations through student centers last year. Also in 2019, Our colleague Ali Wazir ran as an independent candidate and was elected to the National Assembly for his province.
