These on appeal last month), the i commissions now have tre us potential power. It is larg • to them that Spain, a coun cre strikes are in practice iow has one of the highest strike 1 Europe. it is needed for a decisive showwith the regine, as the Spanish ters of the Fourth Internation- been arguing for several years, rolutionary leadership that can. h the workers commissons, o generalise all the local and al struggles of the working class general strike for the downfall out Spain as a whole.
The only political group which does have the sort of influence necomary to sound the death-knell of the dictatorship is the Spanish CommunBt Party.
However the Communist Party is not interested in organising a workers offensive -it is too busy trying to woo maverick capitalists to join its Junta Demoratica" (Demoo ratic Councily RECONCILIATION Since the 1950s the Communist: Party has preached a policy of 'national reconcibation - that the dilfetent sides that took part in the Civi War should forget the differences (and the 600,000 cornses) that lie between them and get together to work for a democratic Spain, Quite conveniently, in the process of arguing that everyone eise should forget about the Civil War, the Communist Party is also able to 'forget' about the fact that this same policy of subordinating the working class and its allles to the political tastes of suppos edly "democratic" capitalists that was the main reason for the victory of the fascists in the first place.
RESPONSIBLE In their eagerness to prove to the capitalists how responsible" they are the Corumunist Party have given the "Junta Democratica' a programme that would icave untouched a hig slice of the present regime, including much of its repressive machinery. and do nothing about the material problems that are worrying toe mass of the Spanish people.
Despite all this moderation", no significant group of Spanish capitalSpain's Prime Minister Arias Navarro - in the shadow of Franco. italist opinion would be upset by it. They have even opposed certain mass struggles - such as December's general strike in the Basque country for much the same reason.
The current struggles show that the end of the dictatorship is drawing ever closer hut it is only the might of the Spanish workers that can do the job. And when they do launch a concerted offensive it will not simply be for the sort of cardboard democracy that the Communist Party is proposing, but for a workers dem ocracy - and a socialist Spuin.
of Navarre. ancy further.
master's voice.. been expressed more clearly than in the recent upsurge of general strike proportions in the Basque province It started in mid-November at a single factory, Super Ser in Pamplona. After a number of mass mectings the workers' commissions called a strike around a platform of unifying dem ands with a deadline for the bosses to meet it of 25 November.
Came the day and nothing was settled, So the workers moved to extend the strike, not as a matter of simple solidarity with Super Ser but calling on workers in orher factories to come out themseires for the same. piatior of demands Soon there were 29 factories on strike, and the one-day general strike in the Basque provinces on 11 December in support of political prisoners boosted milllDEMANDS EXTENDED The bosses had already replied to the workers action by closing down some factories and fining or sacking nearly 1,500 workers, whie the police had played their part by arresting a number of strikers. So it was decided to extend the common platform of demands to include the release of all those arrested, that all fines be cancelled or paid by the bosses, that all those sacked be reinstated unconditionally, and that the workers be paid icades began to go up not any in Spanish CP Secretary, Santiago Carilla But the police and civil guaris had a different iden, letting fly with tear gas and rubber bullets when the demonstrators refused to disperse. Machine gun nests had also been set up in case things got out of hand. However the marchers managed to retreat in an orderly manner under cover of a hail of stones organised by a detachment of about 300 workers BARRICADES The stakes had been raised, Barr Pamplona but in the surrounding villages. Police cars were stoned wherever they appeared. More factories, including the giant MotorIberica car factory whose strugsle set off a general strike in June 1973. were brought to a halt as a series of flying pickets toured the arca. Police attompts to scal off the centre of the town collapsed when hundreds of workers broke through a cordou and marched through the streets.
Support continued to grow. Stud ents in the law, commerce, philos ophy and science faculties joined the strikers, and 30 priests began a hunger strike in support of the workers demands. The stoppages also began to spread through the rest of the province, including the major towns of