THE FRANCO REGIME is tottering towards an unmourned grave. The General himself is now reported to be lucid only for short periods. Meanwhile his supporters are locked in combat with other currents of the ruling class in a bitter dispute over the succession.
The latest figure to throw his hat into the ring is Don Juan de Bourbon, Count of Barcelona and father of Franco's nominated successor Prince Juan Carlos. In a speech in Portugal on 14 June he denounced the present law of suecession as having 'the sole purpose of guaranteeing the continuity of the regime', and called on the army to intervene "to change the direction of the State' in favour of a democratic monarchy "protecting basic social and political liberbiguous line.
La boycott.
ocratic Junta'.
HAVE sults for Madrid and Barcelona in the elections for the Government-controlled trade union organisation. Candidates backed by the outlawed Workers Commissions and other left-wing organisations appear to have captured more than 50 per cent of the seats, with their share of the poll rising to 80 per cent or more in such strongholds as the SEAT car factory in Barcelona.
However the left-wing organisations were divided over what attitude to take to the corporatist trade union elections. In the last round, in 1971, there were massive abstentions with even the Communist Party taking a rather amThis time only some Trotskyist organisations - notably our comrades of the LCR-ETA (VI) - called for The reason for the enthusiastic participation of the CP, which dominates the Workers Commissions outside the Basque country, lies in its post-Franco project of the DemTo carry through this alliance with the 'progressive' capitalists it needs to be able to demonstrate that it can hold back the workers' movement. The CP thus aims to reduce the independent role of the workers Commissions in relation to a bureaucratic trade union structure which it may well fashion with only a few alterations from the present Government-controlled organisation Workers Commissions.
ers' democracy. ary workers state.
Martin Meteyard *The Communist Party is indispensable for the the salvation and rebirth of the nation', declared its secretary Enrico Berlinguer when the results were announced. Party's policy is the only valid and realisable democratic alternative tion of the Workers Commissions throughout Spain...
In each factory there should be a single Workers Commission made up of all the supporters of the Workers Com missions, accepting as their position the decisions of the majority while respecting the rights of the minority. Their representatives should be democratically elected in each factory and then in the various co-ordinating bodies of the This will ensure the strengthening of of the Workers Commissions on the basis of unity and workWORKERS STATE It is through the development of such organisations that the most powerful offensives will be achieved: immediately in defence of the Basque militants Garmendia and Echevar ria who are now facing the death sentence in a rigged trial; in defence of Eva Forest and Antonio Duran who are charged with the assassination of Carrero Blanco; and finally to ensure that the Franco regime is replaced not by any capit alist solution, however 'democratic', but by a revolutioncently they have been seen in the em ergence of a rank-and-file soldiers' movement which has taken its stand by the side of the workers' movement This movement arose in large part as a response to Government attem pts to restructure the army in order to deal with the 'enemy at home'.
It is no secret that large sections of the top brass now favour a coup in Italy, although the capitalist class as a whole recognises that the relationship of forces with the working class is presently too unfavourable for such an attempt.
It was not a coincidence, therefore that the first mass mobilisation of soldiers on a national scale took place at the end of April in response to fascist provocations which claimed three lives. In Milan there was a contingent of 500 soldiers on the workers' demonstration; in Rome several hundred; and in Turin 200 on a demonstration organised by the revolutionary left.
OUT OF NATO In some places there were mass rallies rather than demonstrations. In Udine, in north-east Italy, 200 soldiers joined a rally and one of them -representing the co-ordinating committee of democratic soldiers in the Udine barracks - spoke to the assembled workers. Stressing that the soldiers struggle could not be limited to partial battles, he explained how the anti-fascist and anti-imperialist.struggles were linked up and ended by calling for the purging of fascist officers an end to the 'civil war' restructuring of the army, and the withdrawal of Italy from NATO.
It is this kind of development which has the imperialists so worried Despite all Berlinguer's promises, they realise that every step the CP takes on the road to governmental office threatens to trigger off mass mobilisations which could escape beyond its control into a specifically anti-capitalist offensive. The election results are only the latest confirmation that as a European-wide workers upsurge gets under way our Italian comrades are ready and waiting to play their part.