COUNTERREVOLUTIONARIES STRIKE AGAIN IN ALGERIA.
By Henri Dumouin
ALGERIA, June e -~ Many rumors have been ciroulating in recent days concerning the renewal of counterrevolutionary activities. led by Ait Ahmed in opposition to the Ben Bella regime, In the interior of © Algeria, where your correspondent is at present, the rumors come over transistor radios, broadcast from Europe. These newscasts are at the bottom.of the sometimes extravagant reports about the renewal of armed struggle in Kabylie, attempts to assassinate top government figures, © and even an attempt to assassinate the head of the government... .
The Algerian press has provided little information about these happenings and has impounded French newspapers and publications carry~ ing articles about them, The silence has favored the venomous and slanderous insinuations of all those who hate Ben Bella, Nevertheless, despite the wild exaggeration, the rumors do contain a grain of truth,
On the Algerian side it was the President himself who cut through the tactic of silence, declaring: "The nation will break those who oppose the revolutionary legality established by the Con» gress of the FLN" [Front de Libération Nationale].
The official information that followed this declaration seems to indicate that up to now the action of the counterrevolutionaries has been limited to terrorist blows against party militants or: authorities representing the government.
In Kabylie itself, the opposition lost a big trump when the former head of Wilaya III, Mohand Ou El Hadj rallied to the government side, The recent FLN Congress elected him to the Political _ Bureau. It was he who declared in a village near Tizi-Ouzou: "We will oppose the designs of the counterrevolution with all our force and by every means."
~~ Despite the support. of imperialism, the counterrevolution does not seem to have any chance of widening, at least for the time being.
[The "Front des Forces Socialistes" headed by ATt Ahmed began renewing its activitics sometime before the FLN Congress which was held April 16822. Ina leaflet. distributed clandestinely early in March, Ahmed called for "rethinking the agrarian reform" and also came out flatly in favor of protecting "private investments" in Algeria and for a "new" financial and fiscal policy. The Paris daily Le Monde asked -pertinently (March 7) if Ahmed's "Front" after its defeat Last October had not "chosen to attack the regime from the right, after having sought to outflank it from the left," ]
[on-June 4 Révolution Africain accuscod foreign imperialist
forces of backing the counterrevolution, ". . 3. Portugal has decided to come to the aid of the Algerian counterrevolution, At Cap=Djinet, near Collo, and at Port-Gueydon, arms appear to have been delivered to the counterrevolution by the Portuguese services," The Algiers weekly also named the French oil interests as-being involved, plus West German monopolists, including Mercedes and Volkswagen. In addition, Révolution Afrieain listed the Central Intelligence Agency, stating that “this organization is closely linked with the Portuguese, the oil interests and the German financiers" and that "through the many agents in its pay, it has already given aid to the counterrevolution in order to slow down to the maximum the process of building socialism,"] © 7
If the rebellion is much weaker than the foreign radio sta- ‘tions would like people to believe, and if considerable means have been mobilized to combat it, the root of the evil remains and the problem is to get at this, It is necessary to attack its fundamental social base: the big rural proprietors and the bureaucratic and neocolonialist elements entrenched in the administration and stato apparatus,
- What is required is the extension of the agrarian reform, [See World Outlook May 22,.] This would cut off the social base of the counterrevolution, and, by the same token, open a perspective for some 1,200,000 small fellahs [small holders] and landless poasants who constitute the mass base of the Revolution against all comers, The Revolution needs their support, To draw them in, they must be given something concrete, If this is not done, the chances for the counterrevolutionary opposition could become more serious,
- At its last meeting the Central Committee of the FLN projocted, within the framework. of a house-cleaning opwration and a struggle against burcaucratism, the preparation of municip.l elections linked to reconstituting the party, Inasmuch as the majo*ity of the local administrations remain reactionary bodies or too otten retain, if not the men, at least the methods of the colonial perioa, the importance of such elections is clear. To many persons holding vosts, thoy appear ominous. Thus to carry them out, cspecially i: a complctoly democratic way, many obstacles will have to be overcome,
The self-managed industrial sector includes akout 450 onterprises out of a total of around 1,000. Of theso 3f% are in tho building industry; 25% in food; 4% to 5% are genvine basic plants like the Verreries d'Afrique du Nord and the mesal plant Acilor, The rest are semihandcraft., The sclf-managed sector includes some 10,000 workers =- about 12% of the workers °.1 industry...
One of the major difficultics in “nis "socialist sector," as — the program adopted by the Congress of the Industrial Sector states, is "the existence of a powerful private ‘scctor controlling to a large degree the importation of raw materials, the channels of distribution and ercdit,'. Here the main cnemy is imporialism with its trusts and
“ea Que
cartels that seek to maintain their economic..fortresses inside the country.
To struggle against the capitalist sector, the Algerian Revolution must naturally rely on the class struggle. And the workers in the capitalist enterprises understand that they must find the means to come to the aid of the "self-managed sector" and help move toward ‘socialism, me An appropriate measure appears to be workers! control, Through this the workers could better meet the attempts of the capitalists to sabotage or slow down the development of the economy and, above all, better prepare for the establishment of workers management: in their enterprises,
Thus it is quite significant that the 250 or so workers of Rehault~Algérie passed a motion in the general assembly of their union noting actions in various plants that tended among other things to move toward "control, by the workers, over plant management through plant committees" in enterprises not yet under self- ~ management,
_ These actions, said the motion, “correspond to the require- -. ments. for constructing socialism in independent. Algeria,"
The motion: appealed to the government, Hand more particularly to brothers Boumaza, Minister of the National Economy, and Ben Bella, President of the Republic, to promulgate a text instituting workers control in enterprises shat are’ not under self-management,"
Such a measure, coupled with the extension of the agrarian reform, would rally such forces as to effectively end the hope of the counterrevolution to maintain even a small armed base anywhere in Algoria,
FRANCISCO JULIAO ARRESTED
According to Agence France Press,