Greece

Great success of anti-facists

www.socialistworld.net, 20/09/2005
website of the committee for a workers' international, CWI

The widely promoted all-European summer camp in Greece of neo-fascist parties and groups from Italy (Forza Nuova), Germany (NDP), Spain (Falang) and of course Greece (Chrysi Avgi), expected by the organizers to attract about 1.000 participants, never took place! This is a very important victory for the anti-fascist movement in Greece.

Xekinima, cwi Greece, Tuesday 20 September 2005

The neo-fascists of Chrisi Avgi, who had undertaken to organize the camp, kept the location of the event totally secret in order to avert the mobilization of the antifascists and the local communities.

However, even rumours that it was going to take place in Peloponnese (Messinia or Ilia in southern Greece) at first and then in Central Greece (Stylida or Platamona) were enough to create an uproar of angry protests from the local trade unions, Trade Councils, local government councils, antifascists and youth organizations. The protests were widely publicized and under this pressure even the right-wing government was forced to state that it was opposed to this kind of meeting taking place in Greece.

Eventually, the neo-fascists were obliged to cancel their press conference (16-9-05), where they were to announce the location of the camp and their whole operation fell to pieces.

Yet, in order to save face, they announced that instead, they were to organize a protest march in the centre of Athens, on Saturday 17th of September and expected to attract about 3.000 demonstrators.

Xekinima and YRE immediately raised the call for a counter anti-fascist demo to block the neo-fascist march and consolidate the victory of the anti-fascist movement. Finally, after initial dithering, the Greek Social Forum accepted our call and organized a rally of at least 500, with less than a day’s notice, which forced the 100-150 neo-fascists to cancel their march and return to their headquarters.

These important successes of the anti-fascist movement represent a major defeat for Chrisi Avgi and the European neo-fascists, who found themselves blocked on all fronts and thus failed to hold both their pan-European camp and their march.

These successes are doubly important because both major left parties failed to play any significant role. Synaspismos (Left Democratic Party) supported the mobilizations but played only a secondary not to say marginal role, while KKE (Communist Party) adopted a scandalous position: not only did it not mobilize its considerable forces, but it circulated a leaflet which accused the anti-fascist and political organizations who lead the fight against the neo-fascists, of disorientating the workers and youth away from their real problems.

This important struggle revealed what the correct methods and forms of struggle are, in order to be successful in the struggle against neo-fascism. Only by awakening society and mobilizing the mass organizations of the working class, despite the leaderships being as degenerate as they are, can local communities’ workers and youth effectively block the murderous activities and the growth of neo-fascism. Small anarchist groups, which choose to operate on the fringes of society, using Molotov cocktails and "guerrilla" tactics have no other effect, but to confuse and turn against them the workers and the local communities, and give the police the pretext to intervene. They do not represent any real danger to the rise of fascism. In the aforementioned struggle, the anarchist groups played no role whatsoever in blocking the neo-fascists. However, they were very active on the day of the antifascist counter demo: by breaking and burning, they gave the mass media the excuse not to cover the anti-fascist demo, which stopped the neo-fascists, but to concentrate on the antics of the anarchists in order to discredit the movement.

Finally, this important victory shows the role that small organizations can play, by acting as catalysts, as long as they have a correct approach to the issues that affect society and the methods of struggle. The Greek section of the cwi was not only the first one to take up this issue but also the only one to push this issue to the end. This led to a victory despite the "hesitations" - to say the least - of the central leaderships in Athens.

This article first appeared on www.xekinima.org, website of Greek section of CWI, Xekinima

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