Podemos could lose half its seats in Spain’s general election

Alejandro López & Paul Mitchell

Support for Spain’s pseudo-left Podemos party has slumped ahead of the April 28 general election as a result of its pro-austerity, pro-Socialist Party (PSOE) policies.

Polls suggest the share of the vote for the Podemos-United Left coalition has crashed from 21.1 percent at the last election to 12.3 percent, and that it could lose up to half of its 71 seats in Congress.

Some of its support has gone to the PSOE, which is polling just over 27 percent, up from 22.7 percent at the last election in 2016. The Popular Party (PP) is polling 19 percent, down from 33 percent.

The fascist Vox party could enter Congress for the first time with 10 percent of the seats—mostly at the expense of the PP and the right-wing anti-separatist party Citizens, now at 17.7 percent. It is possible a right-wing coalition government involving the PP, Citizens and Vox could come to power.

A major reason for the drop in electoral support for Podemos is mass abstention, particularly among the youth who no longer identify the party as a radical alternative. According to polls, only 49.5 percent of the population below 25 will vote on April 28.

Podemos emerged as the decades-long two-party set-up, involving the PP and PSOE, crumbled following the 2008 global economic crash and was further discredited during years of austerity. Guided by Stalinist-influenced academics and theoretically rooted in a postmodernist rejection of Marxism and the revolutionary role of the working class, Podemos articulated the interests of affluent layers of the middle class.

It sought to divert opposition to the social counter-revolution against the working class behind criticisms of the cronyism and corruption of the PP/PSOE “caste,” claims of opposing austerity and talk of nationalising the top companies and banks.

Within a year of its creation in 2014, Podemos was challenging the PSOE and PP as Spain’s most supported party (polling more than 25 percent of the vote). However, the working class has now witnessed first-hand how Podemos rules in the local “Cities of Change”—with the imposition of austerity, and cuts estimated at €2.3 billion, strike breaking and attacks on migrants. One of the party’s main promises—to stop the rapid increase in rents (Barcelona by 48 percent between 2013 and 2017, and in Madrid by 30 percent)—has not materialised.

Since its creation, Podemos has functioned as an adjunct to the PSOE. It helped to bring to power a PSOE government in June 2018 under a supposedly “left” Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez.

During its eight months in power, the PSOE proved indistinguishable from the former PP government, implementing austerity measures, showering the military with billions of euros, supporting the US-led regime-change operations in Venezuela, intensifying the crackdown on migrants and continuing the repression of the Catalan nationalists.

Podemos would still be supporting that administration had it not been for the Catalan nationalists withdrawing their support for the 2019 budget, forcing Sánchez in February to call a snap election.

Internally, Podemos is imploding, riven with factional disputes, desertions and a collapse in membership. Last December, the party, which claims 507,250 members, re-elected Pablo Iglesias as general secretary with just 60,000 people voting. This was less than a third of the turnout in the last referendum on Iglesias’s leadership a few months earlier in which 190,000 voted.

The Stalinist-led United Left (IU) and regional nationalist parties that rushed to ally with Podemos when it was riding high are abandoning it. The IU, while continuing to ally itself with Podemos at the national level in Unidos Podemos (renamed in the grammatically feminine form, Unidas Podemos, in time for the election), has decided it will not stand with Podemos in local and regional elections on May 26.

IU congressional deputy Manuel Monereo, a Stalinist and very close to Iglesias, announced that the Podemos project was “finished” and called for something new to be created to give the necessary “hope and freshness.”

In Galicia, the “left nationalist” En Marea alliance has rejected Podemos participation with one of its deputies declaring, “I’m outraged that we have the largest representation in the history of Galicia but we are losing influence.” En Marea is expected to go from five seats in the last election to three seats.

The Valencian nationalists of Compromís announced that it will not repeat its alliance with Podemos. Compromís leader Mónica Oltra said, “It is not intelligent to repeat the same formula that diminishes our electoral possibilities.” Compromís is expected to lose three of its four seats.

The past months have also seen desertions of top Podemos leaders. Iñigo Errejón, long-time number-two of Podemos, has created a new party with Madrid Mayor Manuela Carmena, More Madrid (Más Madrid), with the explicit aim of forging alliances with right-wing parties. The general secretary of the Podemos Madrid region and founding member, Ramón Espinar, has resigned, saying, “When you have no room to lead and do not share the course, you have to go.”

Last week, Podemos Congress deputy Pablo Bustinduy, who served as party spokesman in the Congressional Commission of Foreign Affairs, quit as a candidate for Unidas Podemos in the May European Union (EU) elections.

At a March 23 rally, Iglesias, returning to political activity after a three-month paternity leave, confessed, “I know I have disappointed many people. … We have brought shame on ourselves with our infighting for seats, positions [in the state machine] and visibility. We have acted like any other party.”

“We have not been able to change the rules of the enemy’s game. We have supported measures that could alleviate problems but they do not solve them. We have not come to apply patches.”

Iglesias’s appeal that Podemos stop applying “patches” does not signal a genuine change of course. Podemos will continue to play the “enemy’s game.” He wants Podemos to take ministerial positions in a PSOE-led government, rather than propping it up from the outside, claiming that this will enable him to exert pressure more directly and somehow turn the PSOE to the left.

Podemos spokesperson Irene Montero insisted that Iglesias was “the only candidate” that defended the working class and the only one “who can sit in front of those in power and say to them that their privileges have ended.” Claiming that without Podemos the PSOE would “never have looked to its left,” Montero said that “we have never been closer to installing Pablo Iglesias in the Council of Ministers” and that, if they receive enough votes, they will attempt to renegotiate a government with the PSOE.

In less than 24 hours, the PSOE, which is trying to outdo the right-wing parties in a law-and-order campaign directed against the Catalan nationalists, replied to Podemos. PSOE Organisation Secretary José Luis Ábalos made clear the party was seeking an alliance with Citizens, which “was preferable to the [Catalan] separatists to bring Sánchez to power.” Citizens’ support is “always preferable to those who question the unity of Spain and the constitutional framework.”

While the PSOE is preparing a right-wing government with Citizens that openly advocates for austerity and police state rule in Catalonia, Podemos is claiming that only it can push the PSOE to the left.

The great unmentionable in these elections is the growing levels of poverty, precariousness and the preparations for further austerity and police state measures to respond to the international upsurge in the working class.

The Bank of Spain has already alerted that the next government will have to implement €25 billion in cuts to satisfy Spain’s commitments to the EU, slash the public deficit from an estimated 2.5 percent now to 1.3 percent at year-end and 0.5 percent in 2020. At the same time, economic growth is expected to slow from 2.2 percent to 1.7 percent in 2021.

Comedian Volodomyr Zelenskiy leads first round of Ukraine Presidential Elections

Jason Melanovski & Clara Weiss

With 95 percent of the ballots counted, comedian Volodomyr Zelenskiy emerged as the clear front-runner in first round of Ukraine’s Presidential elections which took place on Sunday. According to Ukraine’s Central Election Committee, Zelenskiy led the first round with 30.2 percent of the vote. Current president and “chocolate oligarch” Petro Poroshenko finished second with 15.9 percent, and former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko placed third with 13.4 percent of the ballots cast.

Approximately 63.4 percent of voters took part in the election. Zelenskiy and Poroshenko will now move to the run-off elections to be held on April 21.

The presidential election campaign took place under conditions of an extraordinary political and social crisis, with the Poroshenko regime whipping up an atmosphere of war hysteria. Before the official start of the election campaign, the Poroshenko regime provoked a confrontation with Russia in the Azov Sea and then used it as a pretext to declare martial law in several regions of the country.

In the weeks prior to the elections, far-right thugs from the Azov Battalion, which was elevated to a major role in Ukrainian politics through the coup in 2014 and is now associated with Interior Minister Arsen Avakov, violently attacked Poroshenko’s office in Kiev, and forced the president to flee his own campaign event.

Zelenskiy won the most support in the central and southern regions of the country, while Poroshenko performed best in the western Ukraine, which is traditionally the stronghold of Ukrainian nationalism. Yuriy Boyko, candidate of the Opposition For Life Party led in the eastern regions of the country where ties with Russia are strongest, including in the separatist controlled Donetsk and Luhansk provinces.

It appears that the Poroshenko regime will accept the results as Ukraine’s Central Election Committee reported that “no systemic violations” had taken place. However, former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, who finished third, has claimed that the exit polls were being manipulated. According to her campaign, Tymoshenko actually came in second and won 18.06 percent compared to just 14.74 for Poroshenko. Tymoshenko’s staff promised to spread their projected results “faster” than the Central Election Committee.

It is unclear at this point whether Tymoshenko will call her supporters onto the streets to protest the results. Tymoshenko is regarded a close ally of Interior Minister Arsen Avakov. As head of the National Police and government militias, Avakov holds significant power within the country and has close ties to various far-right organizations. There has been speculation that Tymoshenko could use Avakov and his ties with right-wing forces such as the Azov-battalion related National Militia to dethrone Poroshenko if she did not make it to the second round.

The success of Zelenskiy was an overwhelming rebuke to the right-wing nationalist regime of Poroshenko, who was brought into power in the imperialist-backed, far-right coup in early 2014 and ran a thoroughly nationalistic and militaristic campaign on the slogans of “Army. Faith. Language.” It is an initial, if distorted, expression of growing mass opposition to the imperialist-backed war by the Ukrainian armed forces in East Ukraine and their ongoing war preparations and provocations against Russia, as well as anger over the social catastrophe in the country.

In poll after poll, the overwhelming majority of Ukrainians indicated that they were mainly concerned with jobs, wages, corruption and ending the war in Eastern Ukraine that has claimed the lives of at least 13,000 people.

Over the past years, significant sections of the population have seen their wages and living standards plummet as increasing sums of money were spent to continue the war against separatists in Eastern Ukraine. Ukraine is now Europe’s poorest country, and the average Ukrainian earns about 350 dollars a month. Millions of Ukrainians have fled the country to work abroad. Ukraine is under IMF directed orders to slash social spending or risk default on billions of dollars in IMF loans.

Poroshenko’s campaign was also rocked by a report revealing a high-level corruption scam related to military procurement. In November of 2018, a preliminary presidential poll reported that 50 percent of Ukrainians would refuse to vote for Poroshenko “under any circumstances.”

Under these conditions, Zelenskiy was able to capitalize on popular discontent over corruption, as well as over Poroshenko’s promotion of Ukrainian nationalism and escalation of the war, and by presenting himself as a candidate who, unlike Poroshenko and Tymoshenko, stood outside the “establishment”.

Zelenskiy supported the coup in Kiev in February 2014, and has insisted on the “return” of Crimea and the eastern separatist provinces to Ukraine. In an attempt to appeal to widespread anti-war sentiments, however, he has also made overtures to Russian President Vladimir Putin, signaling that he would be willing to negotiate with Russia over ending the war, and calling for a ceasefire so that negotiations can resume between the two countries. Vladimir Putin for his part has rejected any possibility of negotiations with Ukraine should Poroshenko be re-elected.

However, while trying to appeal to the anti-war sentiments among broad sections of the working class, Zelenskiy has made clear that he is a supporter of the Ukraine joining both the EU and NATO, steps that would significantly escalate tensions with Russia.

Zelenskiy has also been purposefully vague on his economic plans other than promising to end corruption and enforce new laws on offshore bank accounts. Despite his campaign promises, should Zelenskiy be elected, he will continue the austerity measures dictated by the IMF to which the country now owes over $12 billion.

Whatever his talk about opposing “corruption“ and not being a figure of the “establishment“, Zelenskiy will defend the interests of the country’s oligarchy and is prepared to continue its close alliance with US imperialism.

Zelenskiy is said to have been backed financially by the oligarch Ihor Kolomoyskyi and has admitted that he enjoys a “working” relationship with the billionaire. He reportedly also stated that he shared a “common mindset“ with French President Emmanuel Macron, who is now mobilizing the army against Yellow Vest protesters.

Germany: Tens of thousands demonstrate against climate change

Iason Stolpe

Tens of thousands of school pupils, parents and students took to the streets of Berlin last Friday, under the slogan “Fridays for future”, to demonstrate against climate change. The protests began last August and have since mobilised increasing numbers of young people. On March 29 around 25,000 demonstrated in Berlin alone. The main speaker in Berlin was the initiator of the protests, Greta Thunberg from Sweden.

The front of the demonstration

The mood at the demonstration was political and militant. Many participants had brought homemade anti-capitalist banners. “The problem is capitalism,” one read. “System change, not climate change” stated another.

“The issue of climate protection is very topical today, because it’s about more than just the emission of pollutants. The situation has now progressed to the point where people who are not really radical are taking to the streets demanding radical solutions,” Anke said.

Anke

Anke was convinced that the current radicalisation would intensify as more people protest in opposition to the right wing and far right and the growth of militarism: “Just take a look at the US. What is lacking is education and enlightenment, but nobody is doing that. If you explain questions to people and motivate them, then they will become much more radical.”

A banner at the rally

Like many other demo participants, Anke had no confidence in the established parties or the big business elites. “We cannot wait until political and business leaders agree on any compromise. The broad masses have to come up with a solution, in opposition to the current policy.”

Manuel travelled with friends from the West German state of Schleswig-Holstein to participate in the demonstration. “I am standing here today to ensure that the climate goals are finally met,” he said. “There are big concerns everywhere, which receive lots of money from the state and then go onto produce extreme levels of CO2.”

Manuel

To implement these goals, however, it is important to work together internationally and not against one another, he added.

Another demonstrator commented, “We can all connect to the internet today. This protest was also organised over the internet. Unlike in the past, we are no longer restricted to one city, but can organise across Europe as we are doing today.”

Kim and Lian also saw international cooperation as a prerequisite for a successful climate policy. The major powers invested billions in military and trade war, while companies were adopting anti-climate policies, e.g. in the US, they said.

“We all have to work together internationally, no matter where we come from, irrespective of skin color, religion or origin. This is the only way to oppose trade wars.”

Part of the protest

This was view was echoed by two pupils passing by with a poster saying, “Tomorrow was yesterday”. They had made the banner to criticise current policies and politicians, they explained. “We deliberately left the wording open to provide food for thought for those who are not only concerned about the climate, but also about a policy to secure peace or social equality.”

British MPs again fail to reach agreement on alternative Brexit motions

Robert Stevens

None of the four non-binding “indicative votes” on an alternative to Prime Minister Theresa May’s negotiated withdrawal agreement for Brexit secured a majority vote by MPs Monday night.

The motion put forward by pro-European Union (EU) Conservative Ken Clarke, calling for an EU withdrawal agreement to have as a minimum a new customs union with the bloc, came closest to winning, with 273 votes for and 276 against.

Just 37 Tory MPs backed Clarke’s amendment and only 33 voted for a motion “Common Market 2.0” tabled by Tory Remainer Nick Boles. This proposes that the UK remain within the EU’s single market, have a customs union with the bloc and become a member of the European Free Trade Association alongside the small economies of Norway, Iceland, Lichtenstein and Switzerland.

Given how small the pro-EU faction of the Tory party is, Conservative Prime Minister Theresa May is highly unlikely to make a concession to secure a soft-Brexit compromise. It is more probable that she will bring her current deal with the EU back for a fourth “meaningful vote” this week.

Today, May will hold a five-hour Cabinet meeting to finalise her next moves. She may decide to put up her deal in a run-off against parliament’s most favoured option. On its last vote, May’s EU Withdrawal Agreement lost by a majority of 58.

While viewed as a compromise that could mobilise cross-party support, Boles refused to accede to demands that a “people’s vote” be attached to his solution. His motion was defeated with a majority of 21. He immediately resigned from the Tory party, which he condemned for refusing to compromise, and will sit as an independent.

Boles’s motion won Labour and SNP backing, but the 11 Liberal Democrat MPs and the pro-Remain The Independent Group’s 11 MPs both refused to back what was described as the “softest Brexit” motion on the basis that they do not support any plan to leave the EU.

Motion G called for a revocation of the Article 50 legislation governing the UK’s withdrawal if a deal is not agreed with the EU. Tabled by the Scottish National Party’s Joanna Cherry, it secured 191 votes with 292 against after Labour refused to whip in its favour.

Motion E, tabled by Labour MP Peter Kyle, called for a version of a second referendum by preventing any withdrawal agreement from being ratified without a “confirmatory” public vote. It received 280 votes, but lost narrowly by a majority of 12, with 15 Labour MPs abstaining.

Cabinet ministers were once again instructed to abstain on all indicative votes. But the strength of the pro-Brexit Tory faction was made evident by the small number of soft-Brexit votes by Tory MPs and a letter signed by 174 MPs and ministers, handed to May on Sunday, opposing any form of soft Brexit and insisting she pursue a no-deal departure from the EU if her deal is rejected.

Parliamentary Speaker John Bercow did not select the indicative option Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn tabled last week, calling for a soft Brexit with access to a customs union, and the Labour Party backed the two soft-Brexit proposals. In a letter to Labour MPs Monday afternoon, Corbyn stated that the party “seeks a permanent customs union, close alignment with the single market and dynamic alignment on rights and protections.” He again refused to endorse outright a “people’s vote,” on either May’s deal or a deal that Labour could negotiate if it took office.

With May staggering on in office and her government mired in crisis, Corbyn was on message to the ruling class in his response to the votes. Adopting his pose as a “safe pair of hands” and guardian of the “national interest,” he refused to call for a general election or to pledge a vote of no-confidence in the government, supporting instead the plan for parliament to meet again on Wednesday in another attempt to secure a compromise around a soft Brexit. Given the narrow three-vote defeat yesterday, Clarke’s lowest common denominator proposal for a customs union is the most likely to pass. But pro-Remain MPs expressed optimism that they could secure backing for a second referendum to ratify or reject any deal.

As they did ahead of last week’s Brexit votes, leading EU officials sought to put pressure on MPs to back an outcome resulting in the least damage to the bloc. The message from Europe was that if MPs backed an agreement including a customs union, this would be welcomed by Brussels and an overall deal could be finalised in as little as 48 hours.

The EU’s Brexit coordinator, Guy Verhofstadt, said it would be “really the best thing that could happen,” On this basis, a “new political statement can then be approved at a European summit on 10 April and then we will give the British the opportunity to formalise it in English legislation by 22 May.”

However, with just 10 days to go before the EU’s deadline for reaching an agreement passes, and the real possibility of a no-deal outcome, Germany’s EU minister, Michael Roth, said on Sunday, “Brexit is a big shitshow, I say that now very undiplomatically.”

May’s impossible position means that a snap general election cannot be ruled out.

Reflecting opposition to a general election within ruling circles is the pro-Brexit Sun, owned by billionaire oligarch Rupert Murdoch. The Sun editorialised Sunday that the Tory’s hard-Brexit wing “must now swing behind Mrs May and push her deal over the line.”

An editorial Monday warned a general election could lead to a Labour victory under Corbyn et al who want to “force their Marxist agenda down our throats.”

It warned, “It’s all very well for the Tories to simply assume that Jeremy Corbyn et al will never get near Downing Street—but it would be criminally complacent.

“We’ve more or less given up on the Brexiteers who refuse to vote for the PM’s deal, even though their preferred ‘no deal’ is essentially impossible.

“But those who are tempted to plump for a permanent customs union in today’s ridiculous indicative vote process must also realise that they could very well trigger an election, with unknowable consequences.”

The depiction of Corbyn’s minimal reformist policies in revolutionary terms exposes how fearful Britain’s ruling elite are of a movement by millions of workers and youth being unleashed, demanding an end to austerity, militarism and war, which Labour would be unable to stem.

Bouteflika’s resignation as Algerian president to take place by April 28

Alex Lantier

Yesterday evening, after six weeks of strikes and mass protests, the Algerian presidency set a deadline yesterday for the Abdelaziz Bouteflika to step down as president.

Its communiqué declared, “The naming of a new government on 31 March 2019 by his Excellency Abdelaziz Bouteflika, the president of the Republic, will be followed by important decisions he will take, in line with the specifications of the constitution, to allow him to guarantee the continuity of the functioning of the institutions of the state during the transition period that will begin when he decides to resign. … This resignation of the president of the Republic will take place before 28 April 2019, the date on which his electoral mandate ends.”

While this text promises that Bouteflika will leave office, it does not satisfy in any way the aspirations that have driven millions of Algerians into struggle since February. It is a maneuver of the regime that workers and youth are seeking to bring down, to protect itself from a revolution by getting rid of a hated figurehead. But the wealth that the regime has monopolized is not to be transferred to the working class, which produced it, and power is still in the hands of a sclerotic clique of generals and top officials who are violently hostile to the workers.

The way forward is building rank-and-file organizations of the working class, independent of the state and its trade unions, to coordinate a revolutionary struggle against Algeria’s bloodstained capitalist dictatorship and the repression it is preparing.

Many of the millions of workers and youth who have protested since February will reject this transparent attempt by the regime to hold on to power. Bouteflika’s departure was prepared through violent internecine conflicts between the army brass and the presidency, since Gen. Ahmed Gaïd Salah’s unconstitutional intervention last week, pledging to invoke Article 102 of Algeria’s constitution to remove Bouteflika on grounds of his infirmity.

The new government announced on Sunday precariously balances between the regime’s various feuding factions. The new prime minister, Noureddine Bedoui, is the former interior minister and reportedly close to the Bouteflika family. The defense ministry and the command of the army will remain in Gaïd Salah’s hands, strengthening the position of the army even though the general is technically still the second-ranking figure in the government.

Meanwhile, these same parasitical factions are embroiled in vicious infighting to determine who will control the wealth of the country, and on whom the ruling elite will try to pin the blame for the bankruptcy of Bouteflika’s presidency.

At 3 a.m. Sunday morning, Algerian customs arrested Ali Haddad, the head of the CEO Forum (FCE) business federation who is close to Bouteflika, at Oum Teboul on the Tunisian border. Yesterday, the El Kala court ordered he be transferred to detention in Algiers. Haddad allegedly presented customs with illegal papers and tried to cross the border with €5,000 in cash without declaring it, whereas Algerian law requires travelers to declare any cash sum over €1,000.

Yesterday, the Algiers prosecutor’s office announced charges against a dozen other billionaire businessmen close to the Bouteflika clan: two of Haddad’s brothers, the Kouninef brothers, and Maihieddine Takhout and several of his relatives. “Preliminary investigations are underway on charges of corruption and illicit capital transfers overseas,” announced the prosecutor’s office. It added that in order to carry out its investigation, it had ordered “a ban on travel overseas by certain individuals.”

The Algerian state also banned until April 30 all flights by private jets to prevent businessmen from fleeing Algerian soil. “All private aircraft that are the property of Algerians and are registered either in Algeria or abroad, are banned from taking off or landing in Algerian air space,” declared an official announcement published late Sunday.

General Gaïd Salah is also denouncing Algerian intelligence, whom he has accused of secret collaboration with French imperialism. According to Echourouk News, he declared at a general staff meeting on Saturday that there are “ill-intentioned” forces who aim “to undermine the credibility of the army and evade the legitimate demands of the people.”

He claimed that a meeting took place between the president’s brother Saïd Bouteflika, the former head of the Department of Intelligence and Security (DRS) General Mohamed Mediène (“Toufik”), current DRS head General Athmane Tartag, and French officials. According to Gaïs Salah, this meeting led to the decision to “create a certain anarchy” in Algeria, organize “the rejection of Article 102 of the Constitution” and “incite regionalisms.”

The army doubtless hopes to use such allegations to justify stepped-up law and order measures and the inciting of a climate of fear to facilitate repression within Algeria itself.

Mediène published in Tout sur l’Algérie a reply to Gaïd Salah, calling his accusations a “grotesque manipulation.” He added, “Accusing me of meeting foreign agents to discuss subjects relevant to national sovereignty is a deliberate attempt to harm my reputation. … I have never in any way deviated from the principle of defense of national sovereignty. It is an untouchable rule that I have always respected in my behavior and my actions.”

It is impossible to confirm or rule out any of the allegations made by top Algerian officials, whose byzantine quarrels are infamous for their obscurity. However, certain things can be said with certainty.

The Algerian capitalist regime is collectively guilty of what its leaders are accusing each other of doing. It has misspent the hundreds of billions of dollars in natural gas revenues, pocketed by the families and relatives of top officials, while working closely with Washington, Paris and other NATO powers. It was thanks to collaboration with Algiers, which opened up Algerian airspace to French fighter-bombers, that Paris was able to invade and bomb Mali starting in 2013.

The only way for workers to overthrow imperialist domination and take back the wealth they have created is to bring down the dictatorship and take power, in a revolutionary struggle carried out together with workers in France and internationally. This requires building a revolutionary vanguard, an Algerian section of the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI), offering revolutionary leadership and opposing the political parties who hide their support for Algerian capitalism behind tactical criticisms of the regime.

The Front of Socialist Forces (FFS), linked to France’s discredited, big-business Socialist Party, deplored the regime’s decision “to ignore the legitimate and pressing demands of virtually the entire Algerian people” and to continue “recklessly heading straight into a wall. … The FFS reaffirms its promise to remain mobilized until complete satisfaction is given to popular demands for liberty, democracy and self-determination.”

The Workers Party (PT) called Bedoui’s nomination a “fruitless re-branding operation” trying “to get around the will of the vast majority to kick out an obsolete and outmoded system.” The PT, which has worked closely with the regime for decades, warned that the new government would face “the rejection of the vast majority of the population, as a hijacking of the objectives of the revolutionary process.” The PT proposed instead a “sovereign and national Constituent Assembly” to draft a new constitution for the existing Algerian capitalist state.

Rewriting the Algerian constitution and redistributing the top offices among the regime’s current top officials will resolve none of the problems that drove masses of workers and youth into struggle. The only way forward is the independent mobilization of the working class in a revolutionary struggle for political power.

Preparing for “tomorrow’s wars,” India shoots down satellite

Deepal Jayasekera

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a special “address to the nation” last Wednesday to boast that India had become only the fourth ever country to shoot down a satellite.

The Defence Research and Development Organisation’s success in using an indigenously-developed missile to shoot down an Indian satellite in low-Earth orbit would, Modi claimed, “have an historic impact on generations to come.” “We are now a space power,” he thundered in a speech broadcast on television, radio and social media.

Modi’s ordering of a demonstration of India’s “space war” capabilities and his subsequent hyping of the test’s success in a nationwide address were driven by both strategic and immediate domestic political considerations.

In late February, India came to the brink of all-out war with Pakistan, after Modi ordered air strikes inside Pakistan for the first time since the 1971 Indo-Pakistani war.

New Delhi’s demonstration of a potential to “blind” Pakistan by eliminating its space-based surveillance and communications satellites in any future conflict was certainly meant to frighten Islamabad. However, last week’s anti-satellite missile test was aimed first and foremost at China, the only country other than the US and Russia that had hitherto shot down a satellite.

In pursuit of the Indian bourgeoisie’s great power ambitions, New Delhi, under a succession of governments, whether led by Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) or the Congress Party, has aligned India with Washington in opposing the growth of China’s economic and strategic power across Asia, while developing its own nuclear “triad”—the capacity to fire nuclear weapons from land, air and underwater—with the stated aim of “deterring” Beijing.

A major element in the BJP’s campaign for India’s multi-phase April–May general election is the projection of Modi as a “strongman,” ready to aggressively assert India’s interests, especially against Pakistan, New Delhi’s nuclear-armed arch-rival.

The commandeering of India’s airwaves to announce the successful anti-satellite missile test was a shameless attempt to identify Modi with India’s military prowess, with the double aim of mobilizing the BJP’s right-wing Hindu communalist base and diverting mounting social anger among India’s workers and toilers along reactionary lines.

Even as he boasted in his nationwide address about India’s ability to shoot down an adversary’s satellites, Modi claimed that India’s intentions were purely peaceful and that the March 27 test was not directed against any country. A subsequent Ministry of External Affairs statement asserted India is “against the weaponisation of Outer Space and support(s) international efforts to reinforce the safety and security of space based assets.”

However, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, appearing at a press conference with Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman only hours after Modi’s address, was much more forthright, declaring that India has to prepare for “tomorrow’s wars.”

“We should remember,” said Jaitley, “tomorrow’s wars will not be the same as yesterday’s wars. Conventional army, navy, cyber, space… we have to prepare for all these. We are in such a geopolitical situation in the world, where our preparedness is our deterrent and … our biggest security.”

In its report on Jaitley’s remarks, the Indian Express added that government sources insisted India’s demonstration of its “power to destroy” in space would bolster its international stature and thereby ensure New Delhi will be among the “exclusive club” of states that will determine the rules governing space.

Modi has now incorporated the downing of the satellite into an election stump speech that was already bristling with nationalist bellicosity. At an election rally Thursday in Uttar Pradesh, Modi, referencing the cross-border attack he ordered on Pakistan in September 2016 and February’s bombing raid, boasted that his government has shown the courage to conduct “surgical strikes” in all spheres—“land, sky and space.” He then went on to declare the election a contest between “a decisive government and an indecisive past.”

All the opposition parties, from the Congress and a parade of regional and caste-based parties to the Stalinist Communist Party of India (Marxist) or CPM, have voiced support for the reactionary geo-political ambitions of Indian elite associated with last week’s missile test, while criticizing Modi for milking it for electoral gain. This is basically the same attitude they took to the February 26 airstrike: supporting the attack, while criticizing Modi for “politicizing” it.

Congress Party President Rahul Gandhi issued a tweet congratulating the DRDO and the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) on the success of the test, while sarcastically wishing Modi a “very Happy World Theatre Day.” For his part, senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel tweeted that it was India’s previous Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government that “had initiated the ASAT (anti-satellite) program which has reached fruition today.”

In a letter to the Election Commission, CPM General Secretary Sitaram Yechury complained that Modi’s televised address violated the Model Code of Conduct that is in force during election campaigns. “Such a mission,” argued Yechury, “should normally be announced. .. by the relevant scientific authorities like the DRDO.”

The Indian media has almost universally lauded the test as proof of India’s growing military-technological sophistication, although much of the commentary has also argued that India must invest much more in developing its military capabilities.

“Delhi’s explicit demonstration of space weapon capabilities is welcome,” declared an Indian Express editorial, “but it must be part of a clearly articulated military space doctrine that identifies India’s political objectives and technological goals in outer space and the strategy to realise them.”

Washington responded to India’s anti-satellite missile test by effectively voicing support for India developing its military space capabilities. A US State Department spokesperson told the Press Trust of India, “We will continue to pursue shared interests in space and scientific and technical cooperation [with India], including collaboration on safety and security in space.” Washington’s only concern was that the Indian missile test has created a large amount of space debris.

With the aim of harnessing India to its military-strategic offensive against China, successive Democratic and Republican administrations have showered strategic favours on New Delhi, emboldening it in its confrontation with Pakistan. These favours include giving India access to advanced civilian nuclear technology and fuel, which allows New Delhi to focus its own nuclear program on weapons development, and to the advanced weapons systems the US sells it most “trusted” allies.

Like India, the US is aggressively preparing for great-power conflict in outer space. In June 2018, Trump announced he was creating a “Space Force” as the sixth branch of the US military.

Islamabad has deplored the Indian anti-satellite missile test as a step toward the “weaponisation of space.” The response of Beijing—which has an “all-weather” strategic partnership with Pakistan, but is also anxious not to push New Delhi further into Washington’s strategic embrace—was more cautious. In reference to last Wednesday’s test a Chinese Foreign Ministry statement declared. “We have noticed relevant reports and we wish all countries can effectively maintain peace and tranquility of outer space.”

Thai military junta holds rigged election

John Roberts & Peter Symonds

The Thai election held on March 24 was a sham, engineered by the country’s military junta to try to give some legitimacy to its autocratic rule. After seizing power in 2014, the regime promised to hold an election the following year, but even after ramming through a new anti-democratic constitution in 2016, has repeatedly delayed any poll, fearing a voter backlash.

Despite the atmosphere of repression in which the election was held, the preliminary unofficial results did not result in a majority for the military-backed Palang Pracharath Party. Of the 350 contested constituencies, the main opposition Pheu Thai Party won 137, with the Palang Pracharath Party coming a distant second with 97 seats.

Ten parties are likely to be present in the House of Representatives, if it actually assembles, after the Election Commission confirms the official results on May 9.

Electoral anomalies already point to widespread vote rigging by the junta. After an unexplained 24-hour delay in releasing the initial results, the Electoral Commission made the astonishing announcement that the overall vote for the Palang Pracharath Party was 7.69 million, ahead of Pheu Thai at 7.23 million.

When asked to explain the delay, the Election Commission head declared that he could not comment because he had no calculator at hand. Most pre-election opinion polls put the military’s front party at less than 10 percent. A typical poll had Pheu Thai at 45 percent, Forward Future 21 percent and Palang Pracharath at just 7 percent.

Social media carried many accounts of the army bribing voters. When evidence grew that in some electorates more ballots were cast than the number of voters, the Commission declared that “human error” in entering incorrect data was responsible and all would be revealed on May 9.

Suspicions were heightened because of the high number of voided ballots—two million or six percent of the total. Within 24 hours of the poll, there were 1.4 million tweets denouncing electoral fraud and 600,000 people had signed an online petition to sack the election commissioners.

Former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra denounced the election result as rigged. “Whether or not the junta’s leaders now allow the pro-democracy parties to form a government, they will find a way to stay in charge. They have no shame, and they want to be in power no matter what.”

The current election is the continuation of more than a decade of political turmoil in Thailand. In 2006, the military ousted the billionaire Thaksin Shinawatra as prime minister, and in 2014, it removed his sister, Yingluck Shinawatra, as part of protracted feuding in ruling circles. Pheu Thai is backed and aligned with the Shinawatras, who are now living in exile.

Thailand’s traditional elites—the army, the monarchy and the state bureaucracy—are bitterly opposed to Thaksin Shinawatra, who came to power, initially with their backing, on the basis of a populist appeal, particularly to the rural masses in the country’s north and north-east.

Thaksin made very limited concessions, including on health care and financial support for farmers, and ruled autocratically, carrying out a vicious “war on drugs,” involving hundreds of extra-judicial killings. What the Bangkok elites objected to, however, was his pro-market reforms that undermined the traditional patronage networks on which they were based.

The military will stop at nothing to block a Pheu Thai-led government coming to power and have imposed a constitution designed to ensure against that eventuality. In addition to the constituency seats, there are 150 party-list seats in the lower house allocated on the basis of a formula designed to favour small parties.

A cap has been imposed on the number of constituency seats that a party is allowed if it is to receive party-list seats. Pheu Thai, having reached the cap, will receive no list seats while the military’s Palang Pracharath will receive between 15 and 25. Three parties that won no constituency contests will have a total of 21 list seats.

Despite the junta’s efforts to rig the election, Pheu Thai’s prime ministerial candidate Sudarat Keyuraphan joined with five other party leaders last Wednesday to announce an anti-military coalition which they expected would muster a majority of 255 in the 500-seat lower house.

The junta’s deputy prime minister, Wissan Krea-ngam, quickly declared that Pheu Thai’s coalition would not bear fruit. He added that the official results would not be known until May 9 and that the final seat tally was subject to change. He warned that some candidates might be issued “red or orange cards” for electoral irregularities which could affect their party’s seat count. “So, nothing is certain,” he declared.

Even if the Pheu Thai coalition wins a majority of lower house seats, the new prime minister will be chosen by a combined vote of the lower house and the upper house, where all 250 senators are military-appointed. As a result, coup leader and self-proclaimed prime minister, General Prayuth Chan-Ocha, only has to secure 126 votes in the lower house to be reappointed.

Having carried out two coups against Shinawatra-backed parties and violently suppressed pro-Shinawatra “Red-shirt” protesters in 2010, the military will not hesitate to use force if all else fails. The election campaign was marked throughout by anti-democratic measures directed against opposition parties and their supporters, including arrests and detentions, particularly in Pheu Thai strongholds in the north east.

Pheu Thai, which faced the threat of being dissolved, formed the Thai Raksa Chart party as a backup electoral vehicle. King Vajiralongkorn’s sister, Princess Ubolratana, was put forward as their prime ministerial nominee, provoking a storm of opposition from the monarchist camp, including the king. This became the excuse for banning Thai Raksa Chart and excluding its 121 candidates from the election. Pheu Thai was only able to campaign in 250 of the 350 constituencies.

The junta is also laying the basis for disqualifying another of the opposition parties. Prior to the election, the junta charged the billionaire Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit, founder and leader of the Forward Future Party, with spreading false information. The case is now before the courts.

The Forward Future Party, which campaigned for a new constitution and a reduction in the bloated defence budget, received five million votes, won 30 constituencies and could have up to 50 list seats. It was among the parties attending the anti-junta coalition meeting on Wednesday.

The muted international responses to the election signal that the major powers will turn a blind eye to the military’s anti-democratic moves. The European Union and United Kingdom urged that irregularities be addressed and the results announced quickly.

The US State Department raised similar concerns but added that the US is looking forward to working “with Thailand’s newly elected government.” In 2017, the Trump administration welcomed coup leader Prayuth to the White House and wants him back in power to strengthen US-Thai military relations directed against China.

Ruling AKP retains majority, loses large cities in Turkish local elections

Alex Lantier & Ulas Atesci

Yesterday, voters went to the polls in municipal elections held across Turkey. The “People’s Alliance” between the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) narrowly held on to its majority, winning 52 percent of the vote.

Despite growing anger in the working class over the economic crisis, the rival “Nation Alliance” of the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and the far-right Good Party (IYI), backed by the Kurdish-nationalist Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), altogether won only 42 percent of the vote. At the same time, the “Nation Alliance” carried several major cities, setting the stage for deepening conflict within the state machine.

What is clear is that workers’ discontent with the AKP government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan can find no meaningful expression via the existing political set-up.

A disputed election is emerging in Istanbul, Turkey’s largest city, where voting resulted in a statistical tie. As of this writing, “People’s Alliance” candidate Binali Yildirim (AKP) leads CHP candidate Ehrem Imamoglu by 4,000 of the 8.4 million votes cast. After Yildirim claimed victory, Imamoglu gave a speech denouncing the election result as a “manipulation” and indicated that he would challenge it.

Late last night, after Yildirim’s lead shrank to only 4,000, the Official Election Commission (YSK) ceased updating vote results in Istanbul. CHP and HDP officials also stated that the YSK stopped issuing election reports nationwide for nearly an hour last night and questioned both the validity of the results and the YSK’s claim that the stoppage was due to a “technical malfunction.”

CHP candidate Mansur Yavas carried Ankara with 50.6 percent of the 3 million votes cast, and the CHP retained its stronghold of Izmir, with 58.1 percent of the 2 million votes cast. AKP candidate Alinur Aktas carried Bursa with 49.5 percent of 1.6 million votes cast. CHP candidates carried the cities of Antalya and Adana, with 50.8 percent and 53 percent of the votes, respectively.

In the Kurdish-majority southeast, the HDP’s Adnan Selcuk Mizrakli won the largest city, Diyarbakir, with 58 percent. However, the HDP lost the vote in a number of smaller cities in the region—several to AKP “trustee” mayors imposed by the Erdogan government during its anti-democratic crackdown on Kurdish areas, and one to the Stalinist Communist Party of Turkey.

The HDP is alleging electoral fraud in one such city, Sirnak, which it carried in the last election with 59.6 percent of the vote, but lost this time to the AKP, which won 61.9 percent of the vote. The HDP stated that “since January, after the eligible voters were officially announced in each neighborhood, there has been a massive transfer of military and security forces to the city.” It continued: “Our efforts to reclaim these actions were rejected. This is a threat against democracy, this is a coup against Sirnak city.”

After the results were announced, Erdogan gave a speech hailing the elections as an AKP victory. “Turkey has completed the March 31 local elections with democratic maturity,” he said, adding: “The AKP is the winner by far, as it has always been since the November 3, 2002 elections when it won for the first time.”

Erdogan plans to respond to the elections with stepped-up austerity and war. He noted that Turkey now has no elections scheduled for nearly five years and touted his “very strong reform plan” for the economy. “We, as Turkey, will impose our powerful economic program in accordance with our aims and without concessions on the rules of free market economy,” he declared. “Now we have a long period to carry out reforms uncompromisingly on the economy with the aim of a big and strong Turkey.”

This came after Turkey’s leading business federation, TUSIAD, issued a statement declaring: “Tighter monetary and fiscal policies prescribed in the New Economic Program introduced by the government on September 20, 2018 should be prescribed … Only a comprehensive economic approach that adheres to free market principles, strengthens the independence and transparency of regulatory agencies, commits to structural reforms that increase competitiveness and diminish economic weaknesses can be effective.”

Erdogan has also indicated that he is planning to intensify military operations targeting Kurdish forces in neighboring Syria, where the Turkish bourgeoisie fears that US-backed Kurdish militias could set up an independent Kurdish state and win support from Kurds inside Turkey itself. On Saturday, Erdogan threatened: “We will definitely solve the Syria issue on the field, if possible, and not at the negotiating table, as out first task after elections.”

The AKP’s ability to maintain a narrow majority of support among voters points to the bankruptcy of not only the CHP, but also the HDP and a variety of petty-bourgeois, pseudo-left organizations that enthusiastically joined the CHP-led “Nation Alliance.”

Alper Tas, the leader of the Freedom and Solidarity Party (ÖDP), who agreed to run for office in the Beyoglu district of Istanbul with the support of the CHP and the far-right Good Party, was defeated.

Among broad masses of workers in Turkey, the CHP and its allies are deeply mistrusted. Not only is the CHP the traditional party of the Turkish army, which carried out three bloody NATO-backed coups in the 20th century, but it refrained from criticizing the role of Washington and Berlin in organizing the failed 2016 coup attempt targeting Erdogan. The CHP supported Erdogan’s role in the NATO-led proxy war in Syria and, before the AKP took power in 2002, had already while in government established a record as a party of austerity.

The line-up of the HDP and a broad range of pseudo-left parties like the ÖDP behind the CHP only underscores that these parties themselves have nothing to offer to working people.

They failed to capitalize on mounting discontent with the economic crisis in Turkey, which has seen inflation skyrocket and unemployment rise to 13.5 percent (nearly 25 percent among youth), and on deep-rooted opposition in Turkey to NATO and imperialist wars.

This discontent is so deep that, at one point in the election campaign, sections of Erdogan’s own AKP led by former Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu publicly discussed ditching Erdogan and founding their own new party.

After the elections, however, and the failure of the CHP and its allies to capitalize on discontent with the AKP, these forces aligned themselves again with Erdogan. Davutoglu took to Twitter last night to indicate his support for Erdogan. Hailing the vote of “millions of citizens, young and old,” he claimed it was the “duty” of everyone in Turkey to maintain national unity and “continue our journey of common destiny with firm steps.”

This election result shows that—as in the 2011 uprisings in Egypt and Tunisia and the current mass protests demanding the bringing down of the military regime in Algeria—effective opposition will come only from the working class, in a rebellion against the entire political establishment.

Ford confirms its target of 5,000 layoffs in Germany

Marianne Arens

Late last month, Ford Motor Company confirmed it intends to slash more than 5,000 jobs in Germany. The job losses were announced at three mass meetings on March 25 and 26 held in the company factories in Cologne-Merzenich, Cologne-Niehl and Saarlouis.

Ford management plans to carry out the sackings in close collaboration with the IG Metall union and its works councils.

The axing of 5,000 jobs is part of a global cost-cutting program through which Ford plans to save up to $14 billion. At present, the US-led company employs a core workforce of around 24,000 workers in Germany as well as an unknown number of temporary workers.

According to an internal document made available to the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger newspaper, the company is offering severance pay and early retirement programmes to its full-time workforce. The company hopes to “voluntarily” shed 3,400 employees in Cologne and 1,600 in Saarlouis, where a full shift is to be cut. According to the Süddeutsche Zeitung, the compensation on offer is €30,000 plus several monthly salaries, depending on seniority—a ridiculously small sum that “not many will accept,” one 52-year-old Ford worker told the local newspaper.

During the factory meetings of thousands of workers, Ford Germany boss Gunnar Herrmann tried to justify the job cuts by pointing to the competition between automakers in the global auto industry, where “the pressure is unrelenting.” He said auto suppliers Bosch and Schaeffler were also threatening to cut jobs, while major German auto manufacturers, such as Audi, BMW and Daimler, have recently announced a significant drop in profits.

Analysts say Ford wants to cut 25,000 jobs worldwide, with most hitting Europe. A Ford plant is being closed in São Paulo Brazil, as the company exits the truck manufacturing business in South America. In the United States, Ford is cutting over 1,000 jobs in Flat Rock, Michigan and its joint venture in Russia, Ford Sollers, will shut down two assembly plants and one engine factory.

Like VW, GM and other global corporations slashing jobs, Ford is brutally cutting costs to satisfy the global financial markets, which have been battering the share prices of automakers, particularly in the face of growing signs of a global economic slowdown, which has already affected sales in their two largest markets, China and the US.

In addition, the companies require vast resources to convert towards electric vehicles, self-driving cars, the “Internet of Things,” and other technological innovations. While such revolutionary advances in technology have the potential to greatly improve working and social conditions, under capitalism they are being used to slash jobs and increase the exploitation of remaining workers. One benchmark is the Ford plant in Craiova, Romania, where workers work under inhuman conditions with some new hires making as little as €300 (US $336) per month.

There are a number of indications that the current wave of cuts is merely the prelude to Ford’s complete withdrawal from Europe. The company’s plant in Blanquefort, France near Bordeaux, which employs 850, is due to close in August, and Ford also plans to pull out completely from the UK.

In order to enforce the cuts, the company has replaced Ford’s European boss, Steven Armstrong, with 51-year-old Stuart Rowley, and hired Tim Stone as its new chief financial officer. Stone had previously worked for 20 years for Amazon, which is notorious for its brutal work pace and poverty wages.

Ford, the second biggest automaker in the US, generates significantly less profit in Europe than its global average. In addition, Brexit and global trade war are further threatening profits. For example, every third Fiesta produced in Cologne is delivered to the United Kingdom, where sales have already collapsed due to the fall in the exchange rate for the pound.

Auto expert Ferdinand Dudenhöffer from the University of Duisburg considers Ford “too small” to survive in Europe and regards the company’s selloff to be its best option. He has compared Ford with Opel, the former subsidiary of General Motors, which shut down one plant after another. Opel was finally sold off to the French PSA group, which has continued to cut jobs.

The comparison with Opel is appropriate, especially with regard to the role played by IG Metall and its works councils. Together with management, they worked out a series of programmes for cuts and enforced them upon the Opel workforce. On every occasion they justified job and wage cuts with the assertion that the remaining jobs would be “safe.” On this basis the union backed the closure of factories in Antwerp, Belgium and Bochum, Germany, along with the selloff of Opel to PSA, while suppressing all resistance by workers.

Ford general works council leader Martin Hennig left no doubt that the works council and IG Metall will play the same role. Following the factory meetings, he told the press that working groups were examining the finances of Ford Europe with the aim of improving the situation for the company. Structural developments in the auto industry made it impossible to avoid a massive downsizing, but this process, according to the union, could be extended over the next few years.

Hennig also explained how this “extension” could take place, i.e., via drastic cuts at the expense of the workforce. This could once again bring Ford Europe into “the profit zone,” he said. “If we can edge into the profit zone in the next two years, no one will want to play hard ball with employees.”

The works councils and the shop stewards function as junior partners of Ford. They are integrated into the structure of corporate management and share in the profits sweated out of the backs of workers they claim to “represent.” The chairman of the Saarlouis works council, Markus Thal, the joint works council chairman, Martin Hennig, and the deputy Cologne director of shop stewards, Mustafa Cözmez, all sit on the company supervisory board, along with three other IG Metall members.

In Saarlouis, the union officials have already made it clear IG Metall will support the company’s plans. They have sought to convince workers that the union conducted tough negotiations and the cuts are needed to save the plant. Speaking on behalf of IG Metall, Lars Desgranges claimed that Ford’s agreement to refit the Saarlouis plant to produce a Focus model in 2022 was “a partial success.” Desgranges was supported by the economics minister of Saarland, Anke Rehlinger (Social Democrat Party-SPD), who said the far-from-assured promise of a future model for the plant was an “important signal.”

The next move of the IG Metall officials and SPD politicians is to help get rid of 5,000 workers as soon as possible. To this end they will use their proven tactic of playing off German workers against workers abroad, Cologne workers against those in Saarlouis, and full-time workers against temporary staff.

In 2014, the union supported the closure of the Ford plant in Genk, Belgium. Now they are preparing to jettison Ford’s temporary workforce who have no right to severance pay. In Saarlouis, the contracts of over 400 temporary workers were terminated at the end of 2018, and the contracts of another 600 temporary workers are due to expire in June. These workers, who work mainly on the night shift, are currently building the C-Max model, which is being discontinued.

The staff meeting in Saarlouis, which lasted more than three hours, was interrupted by bursts of disapproval and whistling by those in attendance. One worker asked about the future of temporary workers employed at the factory. “Colleague, you can read between the lines,” was the shameful response of the chairman of the meeting.

The worker later told the World Socialist Web Site, “The works council has not said a single word about the future of temporary workers.”

To defend their future and that of their families, Ford workers must organize independently of the union and join forces internationally. To this end they must set up independent action committees and establish contact with autoworkers around the world. The working class is a powerful social force; in Germany alone, around 800,000 work in the auto industry.

Workers must reject the private ownership by the banks, corporations, and super-rich families such as the Fords. The Socialist Equality Party (SGP) advocates a socialist programme involving the expropriation of the huge fortunes of shareholders and the super-rich, workers’ control over production and the reorganisation of the economy to benefit the population as a whole.

Lyft IPO: Wall Street rakes in billions from the growth of casualized labor

Dan Conway

Shares of ride-share company Lyft rose by as much as 21 percent above its Public Offering Price of $72 per share during its first day of trading on the NASDAQ exchange on Friday. The share price rose to a high of $87.21 before dropping down to $78.29 at the end of the day’s trading. The share price fell again to $77.60 during after-hours trading Friday evening.

Lyft’s initial public offering (IPO) was larger than all of the other 17 IPOs for the first quarter of 2019 combined. The immense rise in the company’s share price allowed its shareholders to make hundreds of millions of dollars in a single day’s trading.

Some of the largest Lyft shareholders include the Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten owning shares valued at $2.5 billion, General Motors with a $1.5 billion stake, the venture capital firm of Andreesen Horowitz with a $1.2 billion stake, Google parent company Alphabet with a $923.7 million stake and company founders Logan Green and Zimmer with $656 million and $452 million respectively.

In a single day, a small number of current and former employees gained $1.5 billion in stock, enough to buy every home currently listed on the market in San Francisco. By contrast, the average San Francisco worker would have to work more than 18 years to earn the cost of one average city home valued at $1.6 million. A typical Lyft driver would have to drive several decades to accomplish the same.

Lyft is the first in a series of tech companies going public this year which are major platforms in the so-called gig economy. The Lyft IPO will be followed next month by rival ride-sharing platform Uber, and later this year by delivery service Postmates, along with WeWork, Airbnb and others. Most of these companies began operations either during or immediately following the 2008 financial crisis in which mass layoffs and the cutting of job protections and the social safety net for millions of workers led to the creation of a highly casualized labor force.

The so-called gig economy now accounts for 34 percent of the US workforce. That number is expected to grow to 43 percent by the year 2020. Across North America and Western Europe 150 million workers are now considered independent contractors—the majority employed in low wage temporary work—according to the Harvard Business Review.

In the case of Lyft and Uber, drivers must purchase their own gas, their own car insurance and must otherwise maintain and pay for their own vehicles when not leasing from the company itself. Each of the companies has a car lease program which leases vehicles well above market rates forcing drivers to work longer hours to make payments.

After these expenses are deducted, many drivers can expect to bring home between $8 and $10 on average and in some cases as low as $3 per hour. Additionally, as the companies can classify their drivers as “independent contractors” rather than full employees, the drivers do not receive any health, retirement, unemployment insurance, vacation or any other benefits from the company.

Marketing materials for both companies cynically claim that drivers are free to set their own hours, be their own bosses and make however much or little money as they like. The reality, however, is that working a full 40-hour week driving would still earn a driver less than the official poverty rate of $25,570 for a family of four. In fact, in January 2017, Uber was forced to settle a $20 million lawsuit with the Federal Trade Commission over false claims that its drivers could earn a median income of more than $90,000 per year in New York and $74,000 per year in San Francisco.

At a strike of Los Angeles Uber drivers last Monday, many of those participating reported being homeless as they simply could not make enough money driving for the firms to afford rent. Though there is no accurate count as yet of the number of homeless drivers, it is likely to be significantly high. Responding to a series of interviews on National Public Radio with homeless ride-share drivers waiting for passengers near the heavily trafficked arrivals section of Los Angeles International Airport, Uber simply said that it was “up to drivers to decide when, where and how long to drive.”

“There is no doubt that most of us are happy to decide when we work and turn on the app when we need to. But in terms of the independent freedom of being able to turn your app on, if you’re making $35 in six hours of driving, yeah, you have the independence to work an 18-hour day and barely make a living,” a Los Angeles Uber told National Public Radio during the strike.

The strike in Los Angeles was triggered by Uber’s plans to drop their per mile compensation rate for drivers by 25 percent from 80 cents to 60 cents. “Both Lyft and Uber are driving the wages down to see—what is the lowest amount of money they’re willing to accept?” one driver complained at the strike.

Moreover, the drop in per mile compensation has proceeded by only a few weeks Uber’s own IPO, signaling to investors that the company will do whatever it takes to drive shareholder returns as high as possible at the expense of its workforce. Lyft has not changed its driver compensation for more than 12 months, while Uber was also recently embroiled in controversy over using tips in its calculation of a $10 per hour minimum rate it had promised to prospective drivers.

There can be no doubt that should the Lyft share price fail to meet investor expectations—and its performance on Friday was already considered to be totally underwhelming by analysts—even greater concessions will be expected from drivers.

The growth of low-wage, casual work is certainly not a solely American phenomenon and ride-share companies now operate in nearly every city and country around the globe. Uber itself has recently conducted a series of significant investments in, or acquisitions of, other ride-share platforms in the Middle East, Europe and Asia. Lyft has begun expanding operations into Canada and has recently acquired several scooter and bicycle sharing platforms.

Both companies have been spending millions on autonomous vehicle research while Lyft hopes to capitalize on the astronomically high cost of health care, teaming up with electronic health records company Allscripts to arrange rides for patients using Lyft drivers untrained in medical transport.

The growing prevalence of such low-wage work is also of growing concern to the ruling class. In spite of the companies’ efforts to pit “self-employed” workers against one another in a race for sporadic jobs, the ride-share drivers in particular are recognizing the need to organize and oppose the firms. This has prompted the imposition of slap-on-the-wrist fines for the companies, and toothless legislation meant to improve driver conditions.

Among the latter was recent legislation introduced by Democratic Virginia Senator Mark Warner for a “Portable Benefits Model” for workers in the casualized labor market. The proposed pilot initiative for the legislation includes a mere $20 million in funding, underscoring the fact that absolutely nothing will be done to help the affected workers.

The Democratic and Republican parties alike support the growth of casualized labor. The growing field of 2020 presidential candidates will also doubtless be actively courting the newly-minted layers of tech millionaires and billionaires in their search for large campaign contributions.

Drivers and workers should also place no faith whatsoever in the trade unions, which are seeking to take advantage of the growth of workers’ anger to expand their dues base and act as well-paid accomplices of the companies in the further exploitation of their workforces. Workers must instead take the conduct of the struggle into their hands, forming their own rank and file committees independently of the trade unions and the Democratic and Republican parties. They must link up their struggles with those of traditional taxi drivers, public transit workers and with all sections of the working class.

Workers must demand that billions be made available to drastically increase driver compensation and lower fares. Affordable public transportation must be demanded as a social right rather than a privilege.