By IWU-FI
12 July 2021.Between 8 to 11 July, we held a new Congress of the Socialist Left online. We voted for an alternative economic plan to fight the national government, the governors and the bosses, and the two pandemics: coronavirus and hunger and poverty. To stop paying the foreign debt as the centre. And to continue promoting a single list of the Left Front-Unity and the rest of the left that wants to join, with no steps. To confront in a united way the FdT (Peronist-Kirchnerist party) and JxC (Macri’s party) in the electoral process underway, postulating in a united way the central solution that we raised together from the Left Front-Unity.
The Congress named the honorary presidency of the heroic Palestinian people, the memory of the fallen of the PST (our predecessor party), the name of our comrades deceased by Covid and that of our teacher and founder Nahuel Moreno. We held a rich discussion on the international and national situations, the next elections and a balance sheet on activities. There were many insightful contributions of the comrades.
Since the previous Socialist Left Congress, there has been a growth in its militancy among the workers, women, youth and popular neighbourhoods. Hundreds of delegates took part in the deliberations representing the widespread militancy in Buenos Aires Province, Buenos Aires city, Cordoba, Santa Fe, Neuquen, Tucuman, Jujuy, Tierra del Fuego, San Juan, La Rioja, Misiones, Santa Cruz, Chubut, Rio Negro, Entre Rios, and important cities of the country.
We also received greetings to the Congress from leaders of sister organisations with whom we share the same international organisation, the IWU-FI, including representatives from Venezuela, Mexico, Brazil, Bolivia, Peru, Chile, Spain, Panama, Dominican Republic and Turkey, among others.
We highlighted the Latin American revolutionary process with its centre in Colombia and Chile and the shift to the electoral left in Chile and Peru, opening up possibilities for the revolutionary left in Argentina to turn into a political alternative for the working class and the popular sectors.
We resolved to support workers and popular struggles by strengthening the coordination and unity of the National Plenary of Combative Trade Unionism as an alternative pole to the trade union bureaucracy. We proposed to fight against the two pandemics: the coronavirus and the hunger and poverty, postulating the non-payment of the foreign debt and the repudiation of the IMF for this money to go to health, wage and pension increases, work, education, a $40,000 (240 dollars) IFE (financial help to the unemployed), and popular housing, as part of an alternative economic plan at the service of the working people.
The leaders and deputies Juan Carlos Giordano and Monica Schlotthauer (Socialist Left in the Left Front-Unity in the National Congress), Mercedes de Mendieta and Pablo Almeida (legislators of CABA), Cristian Luna (Tucuman), Liliana Olivero from Cordoba, Angelica Lagunas from Neuquen, Daniela Vergara from Rosario-Santa Fe, the former provincial deputy for Buenos Aires and national Isadora Women’s Group’s leader, Mercedes Trimarchi, Anisa Favoretti (Santiago del Estero), Adriana Astolfo from Santa Cruz, among others.
Also taking part in the deliberations were the combative trade union leaders Ruben “Pollo” Sobrero (general secretary of railway workers), Mariana Scayola and Jorge Adaro (Ademys-teachers’ union), Monica Mendes from Cicop (health care workers), Graciela Calderon from Suteba Matanza (teachers’ union), and other leaders.
Juan Carlos Giordano and Monica Schlotthauer said: “We are thrilled with the success of our Congress, which will strengthen the unity of the Left Front. That is why we call to do our utmost to ensure the Left Front-Unity goes with a single list to the PASO (primary election), calling on the rest of the left to join us in the few days that remain. Starting with the outstanding electoral performance in Jujuy, where thousands of fighters ratified the Left Front-Unity as their political front, to prepare ourselves for the national elections to get more left, workers’ and socialist seats, confronting the FdT and JxC in a united way. Only the Left Front-Unity presents an economic and social programme for the working people, women and youth”.
At the end of the Congress, we sang The Internationale.
