The Basque country after the
PSOE victory
It is true that these actions put on a certain pressure, as armed struggle does. But their political effects were counterproductive. They enabled the government to mount a political campaign against making any concessions to ETA's
Interview with LKI leader The following interview describes the situation that has developed in the Basque country since the victory of the Spanish Social Democratic Party, the PSOE, in the October 27 general elections. It was given to Gerry Foley in Paris in early May by Bikila, one of the leaders of the Liga Komunista Iraultzailea, the Basque affiliate of the Liga Comunista Revolucionaria, the section of the Fourth International for the Spanish state.
What sort of impact did the PSOE victory in the October 1982 general elections have in the Basque country?
This was a massive victory not just in the Spanish state as a whole but also in Euzkadi [the Basque country ]. The PSOE moved from being the third biggest party to being the first. That is, it got the biggest vote in all of southern Euzkai (1), including both the area under the autonomous Basque parliament (2) and the province of Navarra.
In the area under the Basque parliament, it is the second largest party, behind the Partido Nacionalista Vasco (PNV - Basque Nationalist Party, the bourgeois
PSOE government has a legitimacy in the eyes of working people that no government has had up till now. Because of its promises of change, it gets more support in most places, including in the Basque country.
What are the special problems facing the PSOE in the Basque country?
A. In the Basque country, the radical nationalist current is very large. It pushes the issues of national sovereignty for the Basque people, the elimination of repression, and a series of radical demands around cultural and social questions. focus of this mass current in particular is the campaign for an amnesty for political
The moderate nationalists, the majority in the autonomous area, also have a lot of bones to pick with the central gov-
They want the new government to respect the Statute of Guernika, which gave birth to the autonomous institut-
This pact was signed in 1979 by the PVN, the PSOE, and the former rightist government of the Democratic Center
But after the attempted military coup of February 23, 1980, this settlement was revised in favor of centralism by the LOAPA, the law for "harmonizing" the powers of autonomous governments. The Basque government is against the LOAPA, which it regards as a blow to autonomy, and is demanding that the Madrid government change it.
But the PSOE government has responded that it cannot alter the LOAPA, nor does it want to. The most it would offer was the statement that it was.prepared to accept a renegotiation of the indication of what, if anything, it was this framework of discussion, It wasn't at all happy, but as a good bourgeois party it always prefers talking to confrontation.
Facing the demands of the radical nationalists, the PSOE offered only vague
It indicated that it would reduce police activity, end torture in police
It promised that it would study the question of at least pardoning certain political prisoners if not actually of an
That is, it would pardon these they gave a pledge to renounce violence. The PSOE has made lots of vague promises but no concrete
Fundamentally, it apstandpoint of maintaining public order, as was done by the previous governments, and it flatly rejects self-determination.
How did the radical nationalists respond to the new situation?
The main radical nationalist armed organization, (ETA - Basque Nation and Liberty) said to the government in effect, "O.K., you promised change. We're not saying that a left government is the same thing as a rightist one. But you have to offer some.
So, through Herri Batasuna, which is the political party that reflects its outlook, the ETA proposed negotiations with the government. But at the same time, they launched a series of ambitious guerrilla strikes. A few days after the PSOE victory, they assassinated General Lago in Madrid. He was commander of the Brunete elite armored division stationed in Madrid, which is one of the places the section of the officer corps that favors a coup is putting on the most
Apparently, ETA's idea was that while proposing negotiations they wanted to
The government's campaign had two sides. On the one hand, they argued the defense of law and order is not negotiable. "So, we have to hit them. We have to turn the police on them." At the same time, it opened up a political operation against ETA, since the PSOE has always said that the Basque problem is not just a problem for the police but a political question. It opened up a demagogic campaign in the working class claiming that ETA wanted to increase the sort of tensions that were preparing the way for a
The situation is further complicated by the fact that we have other armed or-
ETA-Militar, the main ETA, is by far the strongest. But there is also ETA-Politico-Militar, an old split from ETA, linked to Euzkadiko Ezkerra (the Basque Left, which in mov-
"mass polities" adopted a Communist Party-type approach).
This group has a general political line not so different from the PNV but it tries to give its military actions a "social" content. So, it has carried out a series of of industrialists. it kidnapped Orbegozo. these actions in general have tended to antiterrorist mobilizations. And specifically, in the case of Orbegozo, the workers at his factory mobilized to demand his release. So these actions have not exactly attracted mass support for the armed struggle or increased the class independence of the workers.
In the same period, there were a series of military strikes, attacks on police stations and that sort of thing. In the Christmas period, the military strikes by ETA. Militar and ETA-Politico-Militar's kid. nappings had created some rather strong
Of course, the radical nationalists also did some effective things. ETA-Militar kept up a strong campaign for amnesty for political prisoners. In Bilbao, it managed to build a demonstration of fifteen to twenty thousand persons, which was an important success.
At the same time, the PSOE was rapidly disillusioning people. ernment was setting up even more police posts, sending in even more police. A polarization started to develop rapidly.
The southern part of the Basque country is in the Spanish state; the northern part is in the
The area under the Basque parliament inicized area, although Basque is spoken in parts
It is historically part of the Basque coun
that the banks are a key section of the was a demonstration of ten tousand perfavors a military coup. sons called by the political parties, in-
Secondly, this may have something to do cluding the PSOE and the CP. The main
Q. What did the moderate Basque nationalists do in this situation?
The Basque government could see launched what was called the "Front for Peace Offensive." The chairman of the Basque autonomous parliament proposed negotiations with Herri Batasuna and the PSOE government on the basis of the Five Points of the KAS (a radical nationalist coordinating group that became the leading nucleus of Herri Batasuna). These five points are the following:
Amnesty for political prisoners. autonomy statute offering greater sovereignty than the present one.
Legalization of the Basque political forces that are for independence.
4. Incorporation of Navarra in the Basque country.
5. Phased withdrawal of the Spanish forces of public order, and subordination of the army units in Euzkadi to the autonomous institutions.
What the chairman of the Basque parwith the banks not paying the revolu-
Banco de Vizcaya they apparently tried to carry out a psychological operation. That is, the idea seems to have been that you go in, plant a bomb, then phone in an alarm, and then once the area is cleared explode the bomb to show that it wasn't a joke. The Banco de Vizcaya building is huge, and thousands of people go in and around it in a day. That is, a few bombings and you could create a real climate of fear in the bank-
So what happens, the operation goes
Two bank workers were killed. This is the first time that workers have died in an attack by ETA where this was the result of the choice of the target. There were some workers killed at the estatuto rightist party, Fraga's Accion Popular was involved, as well as Euzkadiko Ezkerra and other small reformist and rightist parties. It tended to take the form of an antiterrorist demonstration.
The demonstrations of the bank workwere rather different. They were careful to keep them from being turned into antiterrorist actions, that is actions favorable to state repression.
Concretely, what position did the LCR and the LKI take toward the Banco de Vizcaya bombing?
A. Both in Euzkadi and in the rest of the state, we said that this was not an the working class but that it was a violation of the rights of the bank workers because it was an indiscriminate attack and because it was carried out de-
LAIR liament proposed was a more moderate version of these five points. Instead of amnesty, for example, he called on the government to consider setting up an autonomous Basque police force. In the case of Navarra, he proposed negotiations between the Basque autonomous government and the autonomous government that has been set up for Navarra.
In effect, the PNV was saying to the PSOE, "You can't continue the same old centralist policy that the previous governments carried out. You have to offer some signs that you are prepared to understand the Basque problem." That is, the PNV took the stance of a nationalist organization talking to a Spanish centralist one but one that was nonetheless left and favorable to a democratic solution.
At the same time, the PNV said to Herri Batasuna: tive. There are some things we can agree about. But you have to recognize that some tactical flexibility is necessary. We have to find a focus that the majority of the Basque people can be united around.
"The demands you are making are too tough. On the other hand, the Madrid government is still the Madrid government. It says that it is not going to sit down to negotiations until the ETA declares a truce. On the other hand, ETA says it's not going to sit down to negotiations until the government meets a series of demands. Obviously, something has
It's not necessary to have a truce before negotiations but a truce can be the result of negotiations."
Q. Did the PNV have any success with its negotiations proposal?
Right about this time, there was the Banco de Vizcaya disaster. Over the past year, ETA has been carrying out a lot of attacks on banks. First, they say
EZ
Lemoniz nuclear plant, but there the plant itself was clearly the target, since the aim was to shut it down.
Of course, the action at the Banco de Vizcaya was not directed against the workers but against the bank. But since the ETA planted the bomb in a place that was not a nerve center in a way calculated to create terror, it was understood by the working class as adventurist action directed against them.
This was just the chance that the Madrid government needed to break off any attempt to start negotiations. This action forced the PNV to make a long retreat. It even created tensions in the radical nationalist current itself. For example, the union confederation LAB (the Patriotic Workers Association), which is linked to Herri Batasuna, has a base among
And it was obliged to support their call for a protest strike. Of against the killing of the two workers and the political manipulation of this inci-
On the evening of the bombing, there
Young Basque activists (DR) spite the fact that the risks of something like that happening were high. criticized the disregard for the political context that it showed.
We supported the mobilizations of the bank workers. This is the first time in Euzkadi that the party has supported an
But it has to be remembered that even the Herri Batasunadominated union itself, the LAB, was forced to participate.
We supported only the bank workers mobilizations. We were against those called by the political parties. We refused to participate in antiterrorist mobilizations, because these have always opened up the way for more police repression. Our comrades who play leading roles in the bank workers union made harsh criticisms of ETA. At the same time, a comrade who plays an important role in the Madrid bank workers union had a decisive influence in keeping the demonstration there from being converted into an antiETA, anti-Basque demonstration.
I think that the political situation has deteriorated a bit for Herri Batasuna since the bombing. Already in the elections in
October it was clear that it was losing
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OTAN NO que parliament, the PSOE central gov- lot of shades of this. And that time there this law unconstitutional because they re- supported the various options from quire certain types of officials to know Basque.
Imagine what would happen if the Basque parliament tried to pass a more Basque law.
So, in this situation, the Basque revival organizations have been radicalizerreterendum orain ing.
They demand that Basque be the sole official language. The supporters of these groups are beginning to refuse to talk to immigrants from other parts of bases quera
'No NATO bases, for a referendum' (DR)
momentum. It did not suffer losses but it did not make any gains either.
So, now there is a fairly intense debate going on in Herri Batasuna about participating in governmental institutions. It does not participate now except in the municipalities, which they say offer a certain connection with the people. It does not participate in the Spanish parliament, and there is no argument about
But there has been a debate over participating in the Basque and Navarran
Just recently, they decided
Q. What has the effect of this been on the moderate nationalists, the Basque government and the PNV?
They are being squeezed tighter. The Madrid government has taken a much harder position since the Banco de Vizcaya incident. It is sending in more police, refusing to make any concessions to the radical nationalists, and even maintaining a hostile attitude toward the Basque government.
The position of the Basque government, in fact, is a difficult one. to remember that the powers of the new autonomous parliaments have not yet been defined. There is still a large area of conflict with the central government. At
LKI
le Basque police were going to bring
How has the Basque government done on the question of the Basque language in education?
Before the teachers strike, there was a struggle for public Basque educa. tion and against privatization. İt involved demands for the inclusion of the Basque language in education. Before the Basque language was used only in private schools, which were created as a form of cultural resistance to Francoism.
Two types of Basque schools were created in the past. One was the ikastolas, which are for children, and are organized by groups of parents. The other type is run by the Basque language revival movement. They are designed to teach Basque to those who do no know it or to teach native speakers who are illiterate in Basque to read and write it. work covers all the towns and involves about 20,000 people.
So, what is the Basque government doing? So far it has not recognized these schools as socially important institutions. It has created another network of Basque language schools but on an the Spanish state in Spanish.
Obviously, a broader policy is necessary to effectively revive Basque as a
Euzkadi. means of It requires good, effective, communication through
Basque public education. good TV programming in Basque. This is the painless way to extend the use of the
Our last congress adopted a position on the language question, calling for "genuine bilingualism." Our policy for our press is that 30 percent of it should be in Euskera, but for technical reasons we have had a hard time living up to that. In the party, comrades are encouraged to learn Euskera. But the process of "Basquization" has been slow. Most of the comrades who are teachers and do not know Euskera are learning it. harder for worker comrades active in the trade-union organizations.
The LKI is very proletarian. The percentage of industrial workers is over 40 percent. In Guipuzcoa, it is probably around 70 percent.
My personal position is that even real bilingualism is not enough. I think that in at least three provinces Basque should be the basic official language. that every citizen of Euzkadi should be obliged to learn Euskera, covery of Euskera requires such a policy.
When we conduct campaigns, we insist that the rallies be bilingual, and in Basque-speaking areas, we run them entirely in Basque. In the October general election campaign, for example, the Basque revival organizations did a survey of all the political parties and published elitist basis, without any control by the the results. the same time, the Basque government now has control over a Basque police and the educational system and in these areas it has begun coming into serious conflict with the radical nationalists.
Now we have just had an important against the Basque government.
government totally meet the demands of the teachers, and at the same time it is following a line favorable to private schools. is because of the long-standing link between the PNV and the Basque clergy.
In this case, the Basque police, which were set up just a short time ago, sent into repress the teachers. the first time we have seen the autonomous police involved in repression. It shows that when the Basque government is confronted with social struggles, it uses police, like any capitalist government. The myth had existed that the Spanish police were the only bad guys, and that teachers and students. It is not giving the institutions of the mass movement for the Basque language any state support. So, we have been seeing demonstrations of ten to twenty thousand people manding full official support for Basque.
Q. What is the position of the LKI on the question of restoring the Basque
I don't think there is an easy solution to the linguistic problem. Basque parliament has come out for official status for the language. just involves some steps toward giving it formal equality with Spanish, which is insufficient when a language
In any case, although this law only gave formal status to Basque and was supported by the PSOE deputies in the Basernment has declared three articles of
Only the LKI and Herri Batasuna used Basque 50 percent or
The percentage fell to 40-odd for Euzkadiko Ezkerra.
For the PSOE, the percentage was around zero. That shows what it's attitude is to the national feelings of the Basque people.
Q. Nonetheless, the PSOE got the votes of a lot of Basque workers and claims to defend the common interests of working people. Has its antagonism to the Basque national struggle divided workers or set immigrants against the older Basque population?
Under Francoism, because of the predominance of democratic questions, and their interrelation with social struggles, the majority of the working class in the Basque country identified with Basque nationalism. Of course, there were a was no differentiation among those who
autonomy to independence. Today the differences are coming out more sharply. But I don't think that there would be any conflict in the working class about the democratic rights of Basque working people if the SP and PSOE supported self-determination.
But now the PSOE is carrying out a Spanish nationalist policy everywhere. For example, four years ago in Navarra the PSOE was in favor of incorporating the province in Euzkadi. lined up with the right against this. It has gone so far that it has gotten involved in the offensive to remove Basque flags from city halls.
The PSOE is showing signs that it has a policy to create two different national communities in Euzkadi. But it has not yet achieved this. a lot of immigrants vote for the PNV and a lot of them are in Herri Batasuna. As for the youth of immigrant origins, or who come here as youth, they are in the orbit of Basque nationalism, even attracted by the perspective of independence. Almost 45 percent of them are for inde-
And the percentage who favor Basque sovereignty
That doesn't mean that there aren't conflicts because the PSOE uses the mistakes of the radical nationalists to create
But the radical nationalists seem to be aware of this danger. And in focused a lot on the theme that everyone who lives and works in Euzkadi is Basque.
Q. What about the PNV?
A. Today, unlike in the 1930s, it is very careful not to look anti-immigrant. It is more the PSOE, in an attempt to maintain its electoral base, that is trying to create this division.
What impact has the economic crisis had on the general political situation and the national struggle in Euzkadi?
The working class in Euzkadi, as in the rest of the state, has suffered very serious setbacks as a result of social pacts made by the reformist leaderships. One result is that union membership is dropping. That does not mean that the unions are losing votes in the factory elections but they are losing effective membership.
Unemployment is reaching catastrophFor example, in Guipuzcoa, there is a whole industrial complex with a certain technological capacity - machinery, tools, shipbuilding - which is on the verge of collapse. A whole number of towns that depend on the production of specific parts or tools are on the brink of disaster. Shipbuilding and steel are centered in Bilbao. The steel industry requires very extensive conversion and shipbuilding is in crisis world wide.
Traditionally, the Basque provinces bordering the Bay of Biscay have been one of the most prosperous industrial areas in the state. Now the province of
Vizcaya has the second highest unemployment rate in the country, after Andalusia, traditionally the poorest.
In the last year and a half, there have very hard struggles against But the workers have been steadily losing ground.
We have seen the phenomenon developing in Euzkadi and elsewhere of community strikes and strikes by workers in groups of threatened plants. there is an increase in occupations. There have been three occupations in Guipuz-
The first was in Bajo Deva. The LKI is the major force in the Workers Comone of the two big national confederations, in this area. On the basis of an accord with the UGT, the other major national confederation, and the PNV union, the ELA, against the elimination of jobs. Another such strike occurred in Hernany. In Renteria, which is the most militant area in the Basque country, there was a
In Renteria, the group that called the general strike was the Coordinating Committee of Plants in Crisis, which included people from LAB and individuals from unions did not dominate. This strike had the special feature that it was carried out not against the opposition of the unions but without their support. plants in this area, up to a thousand workers are in crisis. Most of them are electrical plants, and it looks as if the company wants to take its capital our
The basic problem is how do you stop the running down of whole industries when the capitalists tell you that they cannot do anything, that there is a worldwide crisis and they are going to have to
So, there is a basic problem of strategy. The union tops have always had the policy of accepting this logic and trying to negotiate to get a few less laid off. In theory, the revolutionary position is very
The workers should not pay the But concretely what do you answer when the workers say what are we going to do if the boss closes the factory. We have to be able to find solutions for this or that plant or region. In this connection, the community strikes are interesting.
Another effect of the crisis is that the youth, who are largely unemployed, tend to radicalize in the framework of radical nationalism. The unions are not offering them much at the moment. But we are very much a working class organization with a lot of activity in the unions.
Our position is a bit complicated. We are with the radical nationalists in the fight against repression and for national
On these questions there is no possibility of a united front with the PSOE and the CP. On the other hand, on specific questions, such as the fight against a military coup, we have a common basis with the sections of the working class influenced by the PSOE and the
But the radical nationalists are very sectarian with respect to the PSOE. see it simply as a Spanish state repressive
ETA press conference (DR)
E.T.A.
15
party.
The fact of the matter is that even the bourgeois nationalist party, the
PNV, often has a better attitude on democratic questions than the PSOE.
Liege - w