PALACE FACES A CRISIS by ABBAS TARIQ first installment appeared in INPRECOR, No. 21, March 13, 1975. Response of the reformists In Morocco, unlike a number of other colonial and semicolonial countries, popular mobilizations were never taken over by the so-called opposition parties. No sector of the bourgeoisie or the middle bourgeoisie was even in position to act as a transmission belt for the demands of the masses or to press the dynamic of these mobilizations through to the end. It is a historical fact that the bourgeoisie in the colonial countries is incapable of really and completely carrying out the bourgeois-democratic tasks of national liberation; but the Moroccan bourgeoisie was never even in power. The state power in Morocco is not the expression of a balance among the ruling classes (the petty bourgeoisie and middle bourgeoisie), but rather is a monarchy that has up to now been absolute. Hence, the bourgeois-democratic and nationa list movement, even though hybrid in character, has sought since 1956 (when formal independence was won) to develop a program of bourgeois political independence and order within the framework of the state institutions of the monarchist regime. Thus, in the cases of the Istiqlaal party, the UNFP, and even the PPS, it was not only that they restricted themselves to a legalism bordering on fear and opportunism; they also sought state mediation with the crown in order to arrive at the application of the bourgeois program necessary for the historic development of the interests of the bourgeoisie and its allies. 26
HASSAN II All these formations regard the structural crisis of the regime as an opportunity to realize this perspective in the short term. Their response to the "openings " of the regime could only be positive: insofar as the regime is prepared to integrate them politically, their regroupment on the basis of a minimum program in the framework of a homogeneous national front is for them the best way to achieve the progressive democratization of the regime. 1. It is in this general framework that the Istiqlaal party held its ninth congress, the resolutions of which reflected the changes that have occurred. These resolutions called for: *The liberation of plundered territory; democracy and egalitarianism. * National unity around a common program. * Popular sovereignty, separation of powers, delimitation of responsibilities. *Democratic rights. *Sliding scale for wages and prices; institution of a law on the control of the amassing of wealth. *Arabization, Arab unity. And, in the economic field, the conference demanded: *Nationalization of the banks, insurance companies, credit agencies, and steel, mining, and pharmaceutical industries. *A plan of industrialization, co-management, and agrarian reform.
Union Nationale des Forces Populaires (National Union of Popular Forces),
Union Socialiste des Forces Populaires (Socialist Union of Popular Forces), arose in 1972 from the Rabat branch of the UNFP. Principal leader: Bouabid.
Union Marocaine du Travail (Moroccan Union of Labor), trade union whose apparatus is under the influence of the UNFP. Principal leader: Ben Sedik.
Parti du Progres et du Socialisme (Party of Progress and Socialism, formerly
In short, the consistent program of a national bourgeoisie that favors the constitution of an anti-imperialist national front in the purest tradition of the Latin American bourgeois movements of the Perons and the Belaundes. 2. The Stalinists echoed this program when, on the occasion of the legalization of their party, the PPS, which wants to be "a revolutionary vanguard party of the working class, " they made public their own demands. The PPS, while calling for the liberation and recovery of plundered territory, will work "for respect for the rights of citizens, the expansion of democratic rights, the release of all political prisoners, and the return of all exiles. Nafionalization of the key sectors of the economy, a vast industrialization program, modernization of agriculture, and an agrarian reform. The struggle against inflation, injustice, and inequality, Moroccanization, Arabization and generalization of education, and the establishment of a vast social program. The PPS supports the Palestinian, Arab, African, and international struggles." Thus, the PPS remains faithful to the line of revolufion by stages and interclass alliances. Ali Yata had clearly said so as long ago as 1958, when he said: "In the present phase of the formation of the state and of national society, we must consider that the consolidation of independence and unity takes priority over any other concern and that the prestige of the sovereign is now the best guarantee of both. Hence our support, which is based on a community of interest and objectives with monarchist and bourgeois nationalism. Capital has a historic role to play in our country. " Today, nearly twenty years later, given the fact that the democratic tasks have still not been carried out, the Stalinists cannot but consider even more firmly that capital and the monarchy yet have a
TABLE OF ORGANIZATIONS UNFP USFP UMT PL Parti Istiqlaal (Independence party). PPS the Communist party). Principal leader: Ali Yata.
historic role to play. Their response to the crisis is fully in consonance with bureaucratic logic: a national front and a common program of government. 3. Between the bourgeois pole represented by the Istiqlaal party (and, recently, by the new Progressive Liberal party, a structure that unites technocrats, industrial managers, and shopkeepers) and the Stalinist-reformist pole represented by the PPS, there is the petty-bourgeois pole of the UNFP. This formation, which emerged out of the heterogeneous nationalist magma of the 1950s, grew up within the Istiqlaal party and left this party along with the partisans of the mass movement of Ben Barka, Abdullah Ibrahim, and Bouabid. The charter of the UNFP, written in 1959, asserts: "There are no contradictions among the interests of the various social layers of the Moroccan people; only their unity can defect the aims of the imperialists and assure the realization of the national objectives. The UNFP remained within the limits of a bourgeois program, although it broke with the priests of the Istiglaal party and developed a genuine mass base among the workers, peasants, and petty bourgeoisie (small functionaries, middle-level managers, teachers, professors, students). Except during a "left" phase opened in May 1962 by Ben Barka, who was influenced by the Castroist current (a phase that was brought to a quick end), the UNFP has consistently been racked by many contradictions, which are above all the expression of the various currents within it. The UNFP went through a number of turns ranging from the "foco" conspiracy to the legalist tactic of the National Opposition Front with the Istiqlaal party; it was under constant centrist pressure from its student ranks. Finally, in July 1972 the party broke into two wings: the Rabat branch, led by Bouabid, which is now the USFP, and the Casaresult of a split from the Istiqlaal party. Principal leader: Ibrahim.
27
Morocco Paris demonstration for the release of Moroccan political prisoners. blanca branch, led by Abdullah Ibrahim and Ben Sedik, which still controls the trade-union apparatus of the UMT. Both wings claim allegiance to scientific socialism. The USFP, theorizing its own impasse and right-wing orientation, states: "The active presence of our organization and its growing combativity have made it the principal partner to which the regime has recourse in calling for dialogue every time it has to confront crises. " (Bouabid.) The dialogue is open and its backdrop is known. The USFP has chosen the PPS as its special partner, without always following the PPS completely in its political myopia. Nevertheless, the USFP, conscious of the crisis of imperialism, does not at all rule out a third attempted coup by the army. For the moment, the strategy of the USFP is centered around the notion of flexible unconditional negotiation with the regime along with the other political forces; but should the process of democratization be aborted, Bouabid thinks, the army may well take the reins of power, "not necessarily in order to hold onto it, " he says, "for there are also 'Portuguese' in the Moroccan army. 4. As for the UNFP, because of its proletarian base (in the UMT) it is seeking to copture the radicalization of a number of sectors by making use of the trade-union apparatus it commands; hence its differentiation from the other political currents. The UNFP presents itself, or tries to present itself, as an alternative radical pole that, while it remains within the framework of the negotiations now going 28 on, does not want to become the goat of the farce by placing itself completely in the tow of the bourgeoisie (the Istiqlaal party). In the last instance, everything will depend on the relationship of forces between the classes. A favorable relationship of forces could accelerate the revolutionary dynamic; in the event of a defeat for the mass movement, an unfavorable relationship of forces could assure the maintenance of the monarchist dictatorship and its bourgeois and petty-bourgeois allies. Today, regardless of the tactical divergences among the various political formations, all of them, from the Isfiglaal party to the UNFP to the USFP to the PPS, are aiming at gaining access to governmental responsibilities. The possibility of the political parfies' gaining such access results from the elements described in the first part of this article. The classical opponents of the regime, represented by these parties, are now trying through the crudest and most demagogic behavior to raise themselves above the reality of the class struggle and to speak in the name of the entire Moroccan "nation. " Thus, the role of these parties today is that of a contributing force, a "constructive opposition" offering advice and lending support to the "positive aspects" of the government's policy, trimming on the analysis of the period, imperialism, and the character of the regime. Class collaboration and unprincipled alliances are the gifts these parties are offering the regime in exchange for their economic and political integration into the state apparatus. None of these political formations has initiated any process of mass mobilization or de-
manded the restoration of democratic rights. As paradoxical as it may seem, their role is that of Flatterer of the royal power; they portray King Hassan as the champion of the "national" cause, the champion of democratic rights. It is a sad masquerade that only strengthens the roften regime and sanctions its policy of theft. exploitation, and repression. Response of the revolutionaries and its limits The recent developments in the colonial revolution (Vietnam, Palestine, the Arab-Persian Gulf), the current rise of revolution in the world, and the crisis of Stalinism compounded by the crisis of the world capitalist system, have not failed to have effects on radicalized youth in Morocco. The new left in Morocco emerged in the context of the rise of the Arab revolution and the development of the pole of attraction constituted by the Palestinian resistance. Having gone through the experience of and having often paid the price for successive betrayals by the reformists of the UNFP and the Stalinists, some militants broke ideologically and politically with these two tendencies and left the UNFP and the CP in 1969 and 1970 to organize themselves in the Progressive Front. The Marxist-Leninist revolutionary left has expressed itself continually on the field of social and political struggle ever since its emergence, particularly through the vehicles of the two best-known organizations: Allal-Aman (Forward), which arose out of the CP, and the March 23 Movement (named after the March 23 events in the UNFP). The objective of the revolutionary left is to transform itself into a revolutionary instrument, which the working masses now lack. The existence of this revolutionary force, its analyses and its struggle, illustrates the gigantic gap both between the masses and the regime and between the masses and those who Falsely claim to represent them. The repression that is hitting these revolutionary militants is easier for the regime to carry out in that it comes at a time when "National Unity, " sacred union, is beginning to become the watchword. The revolutionary left has risen courageously against the national chauvinist position of the bourgeois, petty-bourgeois, and Stalinist parties on the question of the Sahara. It has posed the problem of "Spanish" Sahara and its solution in the framework of the common struggle of the Moroccan masses and those of the Sahara against both the monarchy and direct or indirect colonialism and for national and social liberation. The other, no less important, aspect of the struggle of this Marxist-Leninist left is the fight against the class collaborationist policy of the parties that claim to be in opposition to the palace.
For us, the revolutionary Marxists of Morocco, the emergence of this revolutionary force is a historic event that we salute; its struggle is ours and we will work side by side to lay the real programmatic political bases necessary for the construction of a revolufionary party. We can say right now that whatever other differences may separate us, no progress can be made in the realm of developing a strategy unless it falls within the strategic framework of the Arab revolution. Our programmatic, strategic, and tactical initiatives should not be confined to the narrow framework of the "Moroccan state, " nor should they be oriented solely toward the construction of a national democratic and popular "Moroccan" regime. Arab Trotskyist militants have drawn the lessons of the Algerian and Palestinian revolutions. There is no bourgeoisie throughout the Arab countries that is in position to lead a bourgeois-democratic revolution in each country or each state. If the democratic and bourgeois tasks have not yet been carried out (agrarian reform, national unification, consistent anti-imperialist struggle), this does not mean that there must be a distinct stage of the revolution devoted to the accomplishment of these tasks and divorced from a second, socialist stage. There is a link between the bourgeois and democratic tasks and the socialist tasks, but they are not at all separated in time, nor is there any necessity to form an "alliance of different blocs. " For us, revolutionary Marxists, these tasks are not only not limited to the borders of a single Arab country, they are also manifestations of the form of domination imperialism exerts over the Arab peoples and the bourgeoisie presently in power. This poses the necessity of viewing the realization of the democratic tasks within the overall strategy of the Arab socialist revolution, whose social forces are and will remain the proletariat allied to the poor peasantry. In our Arab-wide strategic conception this is concretized through the Bolshevik slogan of the dictatorship of the proletariat. For all the Arab peoples, the only alternative in the era of imperialism remains: socialist revolution or gorilla dictatorship. If is within the context of this strategic axis that the unity of the Arab nation can be attained, which means the unification of the Arab market by nationalizing all foreign trade and centralizing distribution and by carrying out a radical agrarian reform based on the mobilization of the masses of poor peasants. The Arab revolution will be socialist or there will be no Arab revolution. It will triumph throughout the whole Arab region by unifying the great geographical units of the Arab nation (the Maghreb, the Arab East, the Nile Valley) within the framework of a socialist federal Arab republic. It is in this framework and around this program that the Moroccan militants are struggling.
29
REVOLUTIONARY MARXIST
JOURNAL IN HUNGARIAN...
For the first time, a revolutionary Marxist publication has begun to appear in Hungarian.
It is called Levegot and will appear in the form of regularly published collections.
The first issue is devoted to documents related to the December 1970 strikes of the Polish workers in the Baltic ports and to the movement of Polish students in 1968. The "open
UNIONS CALL RALLY FOR JOBS news of the ana the.
letter" of Kuron and Modzelewski was also published in the first issue.
U.S.A.
JOBS FOR ALL-FUL EMPLOYMENT!
STOP INFLATION END HO FAST: END HICH UNAR TAXES!
318G 1S MI
PUSH
JOBS
1 CONOME
JUSTICE
The AFL-CIO has called a nationwide "Rally for
Jobs Now" to be held in Washington on April 26.
The rally is being sponsored by the Industrial Union
Department of the labor federation, a subdivision that includes fifty-eight AFL-CIO