THIRD CONGRESS
OF THE LCI The third (extraordinary) congress of the Liga Comunista Internacionalista (LCI - Internationalist Communist League), sympathizing organization of the Fourth International in Portugal, was held January 10-11, 1976. The holding of this congress, only a few months after the second congress of the organization, reflected the very strong pressures to which the revolutionary vanguard is subject in Portugal today; if likewise reflected the capacity of revolutionary Marxists to extract from the very development of the class struggle the best instruments for going into the coming battles. As the comrades of the LCI explain in their self-criticism, an extract of which is published below, the politIcal orientation that had been adopted at the second congress had not sufficiently armed the organization to confront the situation opened by the political crisis of August 1975. With the LCI's signing of the August 25 accord (see INPRECOR, No.33, September 11, 1975, for the text of the accord and a statement of the United Secretariat of the Fourth International on it) and the LCI's entry into the FUR, a growing number of militants began to challenge the orientation of the organization, especially on the question of the concrete application of the united front and on the analysis of the Socialist party, an orientation and analysis that could only maintain the division of the working class and isolate the vanguard. A majority of the militants of the organization demanded that a special congress be held to draw a balance-sheet of the activity of the Ll since the summer and to work out an orientation responding to the requirements of the revolutionary struggle in Portugal. The preparation of this congress occasioned a broad democratic debate throughout the organization. Theses were extensively discussed and amended and then adopted by the congress. They were then immediately published in pamphlet form. The major axes of the theses may be summarized as follows:
PORTUGAL: - priority to the development of a response to the government's austerity plan, - for the elaboration and centralization of the workers response: a national congress of workers commissions and a democratic congress of all the trade unions; - release of the soldiers and workers imprisoned after November 25; - for a workers and peasants government responsible to a national congress of workers commissions and a democratic congress of all the trade unions. We are publishing below, in addition to the extract from the self-criticism, an extract from the theses; it is taken from the section on the mass work of the LCI. The congress also pronounced itself in favor of the unification of revolutionary Marxist forces in Portugal and for the immediate opening of discussions toward this end with the Partido Revolucionário dos Trabalhadores (PRT - Revolutionary Workers party) . In addition, the congress adopted a series of measures aimed at strengthening the organizational structure in order to overcome the uneven development between the North and South of the country and in order to endow the organization with means of propaganda and agitation corresponding to the requirements of the present situation (for example, regular weekly publication of the newspaper, Luta Proletária). Many delegations from sections of the Fourth International were present af this extraordinary congress of the LCI. Understanding the importance of the Portuguese situation for the revolutionary upsurge in capitalist Europe, the Fourth International and its sections will be in the vanguard of the campaign in solidarity with the struggles of the Portuguese workers, for the maintenance and extension of their conquests, and for the strengthening of revolutionary leadership.