September 21, 2004: Open Police Terror Against Monday Demonstrators

The self-organized political movement of Monday demonstrations started on August 2^nd. It took a rapid upswing with up to 250,000 Monday demonstrators in 250 cities. From the beginning, it was headed by the slogan "Down with Hartz IV – We are the People!" and was directed straightly against the SPD/Greens government. According to first information, there were demonstrations in 250 cities with more than 100,000 participants on September 20^th. In spite of bad weather, the demonstrations were molded by a militant and resolute mood.

Intensive Preparations for the March on Berlin against the Government on October 3

Yesterday, the organizing of a march against the government on October 3 in Berlin took a central role. Tickets for special trains and busses were sold, activities for mobilization were organized, like posters, stickers in the neighborhoods, factories, schools and universities. The MLPD's rank-and-file work is currently concentrated on mobilizing for the march, for the development of the struggle against the government.

Brutal Police Attack in Berlin

Yesterday in Berlin, just before the final rally, the police brutally attacked the participants of the Monday demonstration with its 10-15,000 participants. A press statement of the CC MLPD, issued immediately afterwards, said: "Shortly before the demonstration reached the place of its final rally, the police suddenly built a roadblock and, in full fighting equipment, attacked a loudspeaker van of the Berlin Alliance Monday Demo. The rented van and the loudspeakers were confiscated for hours. Several people were injured. The police proceeded with great brutality, not backing away from attacking children, women or elderly participants of the demonstration." Some demonstrators were taken away in handcuffs. The police terror was almost unanimously condemned; during the night, the police had to return the confiscated van and to release most of the arrested. This shows that the independent movement of Monday demonstrations will assert itself against police terror and will all the more resolutely organize the march against the government. There is sound evidence that the state-governed oppressive forces acted by direct arrangement with the Trotskyite Attac leaders, Werner Halbauer (Linksruck) and Sascha Kimpel (ISL/Section of the so-called IVth International) and the DKP functionaries Horn and Schrott; as early as on August 30, these people had already made the police attack demonstrators. This is an extraordinary political scandal.

We call for international solidarity against brutal police terror in Berlin.

Immediate stop of criminal proceedings against active Monday demonstrators in Berlin! Complete information about the events of September 20 in Berlin – those who are responsible must be brought to account. Solidarity messages can be translated and handed over by the MLPD.

It is no coincidence that this police terror occurred the day after the land elections in Brandenburg and Saxony in which, above all, the monopoly parties SPD and CDU suffered landslide losses of votes. In Saxony, SPD and CDU together lost 42.5 percent of their voters of 1999. The Berlin governmental party, SPD, fell to 9.6 percent in Saxony. They maintained their bare majority only in combination with the low voter turnout, which they try to sell as victories in a ridiculous fashion. This shows an increasing decline of the social mass base of monopoly rule. The process of the detachment of the masses from the bourgeois parties, bourgeois parliamentarianism and its institutions continues.

Police terror of that kind against a people's movement in Germany has been unique for quite a while; it expresses that those in rule do not hesitate to use oppression by open force if the masses increasingly cope with the effect of the petty-bourgeois mode of thinking and, in particular, overcome modern anticommunism. This is an essential phenomenon of these Monday demonstrations, and it was noticed by those in power that broad sectors of the working masses become active and develop people's democratic forms of organizations and struggle, in a close interrelationship with the Marxist-Leninist party, in which the trusting relationship consolidates itself. The MLPD congratulates the Monday movement for its steadfastness proved by its militant core. This is an excellent starting position for future strengthening and expansion of the movement and its higher development.

What does the head wind consist of with which the masses must cope?

• Open split through Trotskyites, the Attac leadership, the neorevisionist PDS and other reformist forces. There were nationwide attempts to exclude the MLPD; where this did not work, the movement was openly split. It was not by coincidence that this happened in a unified manner precisely after September 7, when the Rightist trade union leadership made an agreement with the Schroeder/Fischer government to abstain from any central activities until February 2005. The purpose of this "break in struggle" is to divert the movement of Monday demonstrations from its thrust against the government. The PDS obediently altered its slogan from "Hartz IV - Down with it!" into "We accompany you." Against the democratic decision of the Leipzig Conference of Monday movement delegations on August 28 for a march with the thrust "Down with Hartz IV – We are the People!" on October 3 in Berlin, on September 11 these self-appointed leaders of Attac, PDS, WASG (Electoral Alternative for Social Justice) and DKP decided on carrying out a splitters' demonstration on October 2.
  
  
• The bourgeois mass media try to kill the Monday demonstrations by silence or present them as a small group. In particular, they keep silent about October 3.
  
  
• In connection with the elections in the federal states of Brandenburg and Saxony, a purposeful campaign of disorientation was launched. The PDS was upgraded as an alleged parliamentarian alternative. Above all, neofascist parties like the NPD and DVU were nursed by giving broad publicity in the media to their demagogy that they would be protest parties against Hartz IV, "against capitalist exploitation," etc.. With 9.2 percent, the neofascist NPD entered the federal parliament of Saxony, the neofascist DVU entered the federal parliament of Brandenburg with 6.1 percent. According to bourgeois opinion polls, 84 percent of the voters for these parties on their own admission voted for "protest," not from conviction. In circles with poorly developed class consciousness, however, the bourgeois media campaign about the alleged "protest parties" NPD and DVU showed an effect that must not be underestimated, mainly among unemployed and petty-bourgeois people. Many of yesterday's Monday demonstrations explicitly reaffirmed their antifascist position and uncompromisingly rejected all attempts of the Neonazis to join them. In contrast, the police protect the Nazi marches in many cities! The distinctive antifascist basic attitude in Germany is being challenged anew and immediate expressed itself in spontaneous protest rallies. Offensive educational work and antifascist struggle must be unfolded against the building of a fascist mass base of the monopolies through the manipulation of public opinion.

The situation for the revolutionary forces and the Marxist-Leninist party is favorable.Great openness to genuine socialism and a certain accordance between an obviously increasing circle of people and the MLPD are a characteristic feature of the current situation. Nowhere, however, do successes come easily to the Marxist-Leninist party but want to be gained by hard struggle, in which case they are much more solid. A particularly wicked method of bourgeois propaganda, readily adopted by the opportunist petty-bourgeois splitters, consists in equating the fascists with the MLPD in order to exclude it. To this end, they do not refrain from defaming the day of the demonstration, October 3 (an official holiday, "Day of German Unity") as an expression of reactionary nationalistic ideas. The MLPD considers October 3 an excellent day for manifesting the unity of the workers and working people in East and West Germany and for demonstrating against the government and its politics in charge of ruling monopoly capital: "We are the people!"

As already stated in the declaration of the CC MLPD of September 4 and in several other publications, the MLPD holds the opinion that lasting successes have already been achieved in the context of the movement of Monday demonstrations. The leading factor of a society-changing movement for the liberated society of socialism is the transition to the working-class offensive. Currently, a new trial of strength starts to develop in the factories of the international monopolies. Volkswagen and Opel (General Motors) try to assert even more drastic lengthening of working hours and wage-cuts and to massively dismantle more jobs. The background of this is the intensified international competitive struggle on the basis of the international structural crisis, which has come to the fore after the end of the worldwide overproduction crisis. The militant unity of workers is being forged against the offensive of exploitation. Thus, the nightshift at the Opel works in Bochum protests every Wednesday night and demands the corporation-wide struggle. On September 18, "Der Blitz" (Flash), the common newssheet of workers for workers at all Opel works and suppliers in Germany, wrote: "The other way is that of a corporation-wide strike until the GM dictate is off the table. Solidarity beyond the borders of factories, corporations and countries – herein lies our strength... For a corporation-wide day of action all over Europe.... If one factory is threatened by closure, all factories must answer in one voice!" We shall continue our international information.

As a contribution to unfold international solidarity and to coordinate and develop like-minded struggles against the coordinated anti-people crisis programs of the European governments, the MLPD proposes participation of international delegations in the march against the Schroeder/Fischer government in Berlin on October 3 and sending messages of solidarity and greetings. You find daily, if necessary, hourly updated information, pictures and reports of correspondents of Monday demonstrations at: www.rf-news.de.