IT SEEMED that last week's Portuguese elections had resulted in a big defeat for the left.
basis of overseas vetes [but expected to go to the right], the right-wing Democratic Alliance [AD] had 125 seats in parliament. The left as a whole had only 121: 73 for the Socialist Party, 47 for the Communist Party, and one for the far-left UDP.
Despite right-wing parties in Spain and West Germany, AD pulled in only 45 per cent. The CP and SP alone won more than 40 per cent: and when you add on the votes of the UDP and six other left rau cnn oo carnan uc barue vi the labour movement actually won a majority of the votes cast.
government is a political setback which will make it harder for the labour movement to regain the offensive, in no sense does it signity With four seats still to be allocated on the eSLIKt But the votes tell a rather different story.
Dalking KeiL.
In other words, while the election of afr AD that the working class is defeated.
What it does show is that the class struggle is sharpening. And this was reflected inside the vote for the left. The CP, which controls the CGIP trade union federation and has defended the land reform in the southern region, boosted its share of the vote 14.6 to 19 per cent. Meanwhile the SP's vote fell from 35 to 27 per cent.
The SP, in fact, paid the price for trying to capitalist stability government for much of the time after the April 1976 elections, it collaborated with the IMF to impose an austerity policy which has led to a 10 per cent drop in living standards, 13 per cen Ie ou mc ea ıæ æe ț It was the SP, too, which tried to reverse the and make labourers give up the big seized. The logic of this position was so clear that the SP's agriculture minister left the party to join AD.
federation.
Alentejo Trotskyists of the PSR.
Portugal.
put broadcasts to crime'.
the agricu tura estates they has been achieved.
Finally, last year the SP split the trade union movement by setting up a rival to the CGTP • f cc this in alliance Social-Democrats [PSD] — the main party in AD, whose leader Francisco Sa Carneiro is likely to be the new prime minister!
The need for working class unity around a joint union plan of action against austerity was at the centre of the campaign of the Portuguese Unlike all the other parties, the PSR also major emphasis on the struggle abortion rights. Affer giving over one of its IV to the Portuguese campaign, the PSR was charged by the Church and a smail right-wing group with 'incitemen!
In temselves the elections have solved nothing for the Portuguese capitalists. Big class battles lie ahead. And with new parliamentary elections required in October 1980 under the constitution, followed by presidential elections in 1981, political stability is the last thing that for abortion Sa Cameiro
NO MORE talk about talks; the fist this time. The main aims of James Prior's proposed Rank & File IF THE restrictions that Prior wants to attach to the closed shop ballots were applied to denied the right to vote. 1 ne fight for universal suffrage was something that everyone sup