Analysis

Speech by Peter Mertens, Chariman of the PTB-PVDA, at ManiFiesta, 22 September 2019

Contribution to the PCP Conference, Palmela, 13 September 2019 by Jos D'Haese, head of the PTB-PVDA group in the Flemish Parliament.

Shall we soon have to change street names throughout Europe such as the Karl Marx Avenue in Berlin, forbid the sale of t-shirts carrying the portrait of Che Guevara, censor anticapitalist rhetoric, ban from the education programmes aspects that would be considered too positive toward the former communist regimes? This is, in any case, what a dangerous resolution of the European Parliament is inviting us to do.

Despite an attempt to change its façade, Vlaams Belang remains a far-right racist party. It is essential to unmask the racist, anti-social and dangerous nature of this party, as well as the attempt at "normalisation" that is at work.

The PTB-PVDA (Workers’ Party of Belgium) is a big winner in the last elections all over Belgium. In Wallonia and Brussels, it is the party that has made the most progress. In Flanders, it is the second fastest growing party. What are the reasons for this success? In this article, we look back at the election campaign and the result of the May 26 elections.

As radical left forces were suffering defeats across Europe in the recent elections, the Belgian Workers' Party secured historic gains with a clear message of class politics.

The global economic cramp is particularly badly digested by the European Union and by the central project of European unification, the monetary union in particular. This has led to an existential crisis of the union itself, with as provisional highlights the Greek drama and the British exit. In this article, we will drill for the foundations of this unique project and the causes of the instability in the 21st century.

In 1917, a hundred years ago, two revolutions took place in Russia: one in February and the other in October. The first led to the abdication of the tsar, Russia’s absolute monarch, to a separation of the Church and the State and to universal suffrage. The second, carried out by the people to the slogan of “Bread, Peace and Land”, brought the seizing of power by the Communists (called the Bolsheviks).