HAITI, May 1 — On May Day, comrades joined the May Day march with more than 1,000 participants: workers, teachers and students. We distributed hundreds of flyers and led chants.
The march started at the SONAPI (free trade zone industrial park) and wound its way to the Champs de Mars, a large public park in front of the National Palace where tens of thousands of workers lived in tents for more than two years after the 2010 earthquake.
The police attacked the march and one marcher was punched in the eye and two students were arrested. One, a close friend, was beaten in the police precinct. In response, students at the Faculté d’Ethnologie organized a two-day strike on campus demanding their release; there were also several days of street demonstrations, which were attacked by the cops.
Other comrades participated in a speak-out of garment workers, a way to share the daily misery experienced by workers and to press for their demands for an increase in the minimum wage.
In the countryside, a comrade organized a meeting on May Day with 20 farm workers, led by one who is close to Our party. Later in the town’s public square, we showed a documentary film with more than 500 people. There was a lively discussion afterwards, in which communist ideas and our Party was discussed. In another town, a comrade organized a May Day rally and is engaged with other residents of the area in a struggle to take over for public use certain infrastructures left by an NGO.
WASHINGTON, DC, May 1 — Today 150 marchers gathered at Malcolm X Park to celebrate May Day and reaffirm their determination to fight back on all fronts against racism and capitalism.
One speaker, formerly imprisoned, described the racist horror of mass incarceration and how background checks, even after someone’s release, makes it impossible to find a job and support yourself. A Metro bus driver called on workers to unite against racism and sexism everywhere as part of the revolutionary struggle, and noted a small victory against racist background checks at Metro.
Another noted the recent successful unionization of adjunct teachers at two local universities. A tenant organizer called on everyone to come to a city-wide tenant organizing meeting as part of the battle against racist displacement through gentrification. A PL’er described the modern-day racist offensive of mass incarceration and mass deportation, and how only by building a revolutionary party, not limited to reform efforts, could we hope to succeed in the long run.
With PLP red flags snapping in the breeze and our bold May Day banner at its front, the march surged down 14th Street to the White House, with over 300 copies of CHALLENGE distributed to workers who saw the march pass by. At the White House, we observed a handful of racists who had gathered to oppose the May Day march, completely protected by a phalanx of cops and a metal barricade to defend them from angry protesters. They remembered how the racists were clobbered the year before by May Day marchers! Finally, the police loaded the racists into a police van and drove away — another example of cop-Klan solidarity with racists.
The day ended with bold speeches against the backdrop of the bosses’ White House, condemning the politicians and the capitalists for their imperialist wars, their racist attacks, and their destruction of the environment, and with a pledge to redouble our efforts in the coming year to smash capitalism!
Newark, NJ May 1— On this May Day, more workers worldwide are fighting the capitalists’ mass layoffs, cutbacks due to government austerity, and police terror. PLP’s idea that nothing short of communist revolution can ever change the fundamental reality of capitalist exploitation, racism and sexism needs to emerge from these struggles. Some workers here are beginning to examine this idea. Their actions reflect a break from the idea that the bosses’ election circus can help our class.
Today, 75 people, including about 25 legal services workers, family members and clients, along with community and union militants, marched against the continued underfunding of free legal services for unemployed and low-wage workers; continued cuts in unemployment benefits and Food Stamps; mass racist unemployment and for jobs; and in solidarity with public school workers and students facing the ax of state-appointed Superintendent Cami Anderson’s school closing plan.
‘Jobs, Yes. Racism, No — Food Stamp Cuts have Got to Go!’
Chants of “Same struggle, same fight, workers of the world unite,” “Whose day, Our day, What day? May Day,” and “Jobs yes, racism no. Food Stamp cuts have got to go” were heard in downtown Newark.
Over 150 CHALLENGE newspapers were distributed. This march was a major organizing effort for local legal services workers, and included a healthy battle over ideas.
After a Nov. 1 march against budget cuts, legal services workers here initiated a War Against Poverty Coalition (WAPC). We reached out to unions, community and neighborhood groups, teachers, students, and service providers for homeless people. In February, the WAPC decided to organize today’s march with two demands: jobs at living wages, and restore cuts to the safety net. A demand to stop attacks on public school students, parents and teachers was added.
A sharp debate took place within the WAPC over whether politicians who said they supported the demands of the march should be allowed to speak on May Day. Some honestly believed that having the politicians on our side will help win our demands. They also didn’t see a viable alternative to voting as a way to change the system. Opponents strongly argued that, no matter who the individual politician is, their role is to serve the current masters of society, the ruling class. They also said that any politician who speaks will use that opportunity for their own narrow political purpose — getting elected.
The Coalition decided to only recognize those politicians who supported the demands of the march, but to not allow them to speak. Because there are hotly-contested May 13 mayoral and city council elections, various Democratic Party candidates or staffers contacted the Coalition and unsuccessfully tried to worm their way on to the speakers’ list. However, WAPC stuck to its position.
The legal services worker who spoke for WAPC linked the cutbacks to war preparations. She said U.S. bosses “are trying to use us as mere pawns in their war games in their battle for supremacy against other international imperialists around the globe” and said that we should fight back instead of allowing these same bosses to place us “in a Hunger Games Arena.”
The community fighter stated it was not enough to fight for reforms; that we must also fight for revolution to change the economic and political system that workers live under. However, he hoped such a revolution would not require violent struggle. He invoked Martin Luther King’s pacifism and Frederick Douglass’s call to action against slavery.
Only Armed Struggle Can Topple the Bosses
PLP says there can’t be a peaceful revolution to get rid of capitalism. For centuries, oppressed people who rose up against their masters, kings and bosses to change conditions were violently suppressed by these same rulers. The struggle to abolish chattel slavery in the U.S., which did not end all forms of exploitation here, only came through armed struggle against the armies of the plantation owners. As Marx said, “Force is the midwife of every old society pregnant with a new one.” It has taken many lost lives and broken spirits for class-conscious workers to realize that neither the election of “progressive” candidates, or a mass reform movement, or both, can break the power of any boss-run government.
The final rally ended with the singing of the Internationale, a song written by a transport worker who fled the Paris Commune (an uprising of workers that led to the first worker-run government in the world) in 1871 to escape the slaughter of 30,000 Communards by the army of the French capitalists. One worker was inspired and asked for words to that song. As we move to the next stage in this struggle against capitalism, we are a step closer to the “better world in birth” that PLP is fighting for.
Tel-Aviv, May 1 — Hundreds of workers and activists marched in central Tel-Aviv with red flags and banners, some decorated with the hammer and sickle, the traditional communist symbol of industrial and farm workers’ unity. We, the PL’ers in Israel-Palestine, all came to this march, with our red shirts, as well as the local leaflet “Why Communism?”
While the May Day march was organized by the thoroughly pseudo-leftist “Communist” Party of Israel, as well as the usual liberals, many radicalized and militant youth and workers came as well. One demonstrator, who was dressed in a WWII-era Red Army uniform, upon seeing our leaflet told us that he supports the way of Stalin and Mao! Another young worker from the “C”P Youth, told us he stands against the CP leadership and supports what was written in our leaflet.
The main call of the march was for a 30 ILS ($8.5) hourly minimum wage, instead of the current 25 ILS ($7), which is now the main campaign of the reformists. This is an important struggle, as one cannot make a living out of a minimum wage even when working full-time. But we must ask — would asking for a few more crumbs off the bosses’ table change the essential nature of the working class’s exploitation by the tycoons?
What we need to fight for is not a few more scraps of bread, but the whole bakery. This is why we openly call for communist revolution.
SAN FRANCISCO, May 1 — PLP here planned two events to celebrate May Day: a Backyard BBQ and a contingent in the May 1 Oakland Sin Fronteras (No Borders) Coalition.
Workers Struggles Have No Borders
As we marched alongside our sisters and brothers to celebrate May Day we chanted in Spanish and English “Obreras unidos jamas seran vencidos,” “The workers united can never be defeated” and “Fight for Communism, Power to the workers,” Primero de Mayo, Communista y Proletario.”
We traded chants with other groups about international solidarity and multiracial unity. Some from other groups joined us in our call for communist revolution.
A multiracial, international, and multi-generational crowd of over 60 gathered to socialize and celebrate May Day. It was a wide circle of friends, comrades, neighbors, family, coworkers, retirees, and friends of friends.
A short speech discussed lessons PLP has drawn from the world communist movement and the rise of a police state. One main point was that under President Obama, “the deporter-in-chief”, a police state apparatus has deported more than two million undocumented workers. The racist USA has the biggest incarcerated population in the world, mostly black and Latino workers and youth.
This May Day shows the potential for international workers’ unity to grow since workers from every continent were present. PLP members’ active participation in the schools, on the job and in community groups can help move the agenda towards developing class consciousness: we are all in one huge, international working class. We think these are small steps to building a mass communist party and movement among workers of the world. The International working class can become a tornado to destroy capitalism.
