Trotskyists Unify in Mexico
Following a decision of the International Executive Committee of the Fourth International at the end of 1975, a unification process was set in motion by the two sympathizing organizations of the International in Mexico, the Liga Camunista Internacionalista (LCI -Internationalist Communist League) and the Liga Socialista (LS - Socialist League) . In May 1976 the Political Bureaus of the two groups decided to initiate a period of common work on all levels, from cells to leadership, and in June a new step was taken with the fusion of the two periodicals, Bandera Roja (LCI) and El Socialista (LS). A parity commission drafted documents proposed by the EC as a programmatic and political basis for the unification, and these documents were submitted to discussion by the militants of the two organizations. Finally, in September a conference of the LCl and a congress of the LS were held and ratified unification. This was immediately followed by a fusion congress, held September 17-19. The congress took place in the "Miguel Enriquez" auditorium of the University of Mexico, with the participation of 200 delegates (about one-third from the LS and two-thirds from the LCI), 800 observers (militants and sympathizers of the two organizations), and fraternal delegations from the United States, France, Argentina, Colombia, and other countries. A delegation of the United Secretariat of the Fourth International attended the congress and greeted the unification of revolutionary Marxists as a historic step toward building the revolutionary party of the Mexican proletariat. By acclamotion the comrades of the Partido Socialista de los Trabajadores (PST - Socialist Workers party) imprisoned in Argentina (José Páez and others) and Comrade Mario Roberto Santucho, ex-militant of the Fourth Internafional recently murdered by the Argentine gorillas, were named honorary presidents of the congress. Four documents were submitted to the 200 delegates and were approved either unanimously or by strong ma¡orities: a programmatic resolution containing the principled accords between the two groups; the statutes; a document on the Mexican revolution; and a political resolution on the present conjuncture. Future issues of INPRECOR will publish excerpts of these documents, which, on the basis of the theoretical arsenal of Trotskyism (permanent revolution, Leninist conception of the party, necessity of armed struggle, transitional program) formulate a coherent revolutionary strategy for the workers and peasants movements in Mexico while also analyzing the specific features of the country: the revolutionary tradition of 1910, the Bonapartist character of the bourgeois state, the weight of the trade-union bureaucracy organically linked to the state, the ambiguities of the "revolutionary nationalist" opposition represented by the electricians' union, etc. The delegates also held a debate on the workers movement in
Mexico and a discussion on international questions; there was no vote on these discussions. The new, unified party will be called the Partido Revolucionario de los Trabajadores (PRT - Revolutionary Workers party), Mexican section of the Fourth Internafional, and its periodical will be called Bandera Socialisto. The PRT is an organization present in most of the states of Mexico and now constitutes the major political force left of the Communist party. It has a base not only in the schools and universities (where the organization arose in 1968), but also in a growing number of factories and trade unions; in addition, its influence among the most radicalized sectors of the peasant movement is growing rapidly. It will soon be able to become the leading force among the broad vanguard of youth and workers and an alternative pole to the reformist currents within the workers and people's movement. From this standpoint, the unification represents much more than the sum of the forces of the two organizations: it constitutes a qualitative leap toward winning the masses to the revolutionary Marxist program. The recent economic and political measures taken by the Mexican government (devaluation of the peso, repression against the trade-union opposition) are symptoms of the crisis of the bourgeois Bonapartist system represented by the PRI (Institutional Revolutionary party); which has held power for more than fifty years now. Under the conditions of aggravation of class contradictions during the period now opening, the unification of revolutionary Marxists will enable them to play a much more significant role within the struggles of the students, workers, and peasants, which are beginning to develop everywhere. Moreover, at a time when military regimes are increasing in number and intensifying repression in Central America and in the southern cone of the continent, the Mexican PRT will develop and extend its work in support of the building of the Fourth International in Central America, which was begun by the LCI (which publishes the bulletin Revolución Socialista). The fusion of the LC! and the LS shows that in spite of genuine political differences (especially on international questions), currents that locate themselves on the programmatic terrain of the revolutionary Marxism of the Fourth International can and must unite in a single organization and settle their debates in the framework of democratic centralism. The unification of the Mexican Trotskyists can thereby serve as a point of departure for a process of overcoming the splits that have occurred within the Fourth International in other countries. The PRT is a young organization, most of whose members became politically active after 1968. But it sees itself os the heir to revolutionary Marxist and Bolshevik tradition (represented at the congress by the presence of Vlady, the son of Victor Serge, a well-known muralist who greeted the delegates in the name of the old Russian left opposition). •
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The article "The Palestinian Resistance Faces Critical Choices, "by Selim Accawi, which appeared in INPRECOR No. 58, September 23, 1976, has elicited the following letter from Naim
Khoder, official representative of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in Brussels. We are publishing it for the information of our readers, along with a response from Comrade Accawi.
Dear Friends, I read INPRECOR regularly and follow with great attention its articles dealing with the problems of the Middle East. I must confess that these articles have always disappointed me, and it is with bitterness that I note that the positions adopted by the Fourth International on the Palestinian problem are becoming increasingly theoretical, abstract, and unrealistic, not to say erroneous. The article "The Palestinian Resistance Faces Critical Choices, *which appeared in No.58, September 23, 1976, is no exception to this rule; quite the opposite. I find it regreftable that the Fourth International is so negative, intolerant, and unfair in regard to the Palestinian revolution just at the moment when the Palestinian people are the victim of a new conspiracy and just at the moment when they need the total solidarity of the whole international left, above and beyond differences and criticisms. For the author of the article in question, who signs with an Arab name but appears to live on the moon, all the Palestinian organizations are opportunist. Nevertheless, all the political tendencies of the left and center-left are inside the PLO. It is curious to note that none of these organizations seem to please the author. Could this be an index of the epicentrism of the Fourth International and a sign of intolerance? Are we to understand that any left organization that does not share the options and analyses of the Fourth International is necessarily opportunist? As far as the Lebanese conflict is concerned, the author seems to believe that all is lost: the determination of 30 on the line of the PLO the Palestinians to defend themselves to the end would be useless in any event, for a victory of the Palestinoprogressive forces over the Syrian army and the fascist Forces is excluded. From another angle, any compromise the PLO seems to seek is presented in advance as a betrayal and, for the author, constitutes a concession made by the leadership of the PLO against the Palestinian rank and file. Moreover, I wonder what the term "Palestinian rank and file" means to the author! Is he unaware of the fact that the overwhelming majority of the Palestinians in Lebanon are part of the various organizations that are members of the PLO and are structured by them, that it is the Palestinian rank and file that is fighting in