STATEMENTS & PRESS RELEASES

 

MAY DAY STATEMENT
May 1, 2003
Patricio Ramirez
Spokesperson
Partido ng Manggagawang Pilipino


Joint May Day rally is an inspiring event

The Party wholeheartedly welcomes the joint May Day rally and program of groups and federations such as the Partido ng Manggagawa, Bukluran ng Manggagawang Pilipino, National Confederation of Labor, NAFLU, NFL, Makabayan-KPD and Katipunan that erstwhile held separate Labor Day activities. The "unity of the X-Men," the joint rally of these groups that split from the KMU augur well for the advance of the militant workers movement.

If national unity must be forged to face the challenge of the SARS outbreak, all the more must labor unity be fashioned for workers to confront the epidemic of contractualization, casualization, mass layoff and low wages that are the symptoms of globalization. Globalization is a far more virulent disease that has wrecked more lives than the dreaded SARS virus.

Labor unity is dream that is now slowly becoming reality. The unprecedented joint May Day rally is a shining example for the rest of organized labor and an inspiring event for the lot of unorganized workers. This germ of labor unity must be nurtured to grow into a united front of struggle against globalization. This is a mere first step that must be followed by solidarity in launching labor strikes and unity in launching labor struggles.

Factionalism and sectarianism has debilitated the labor movement and weakened labor struggles in the face of the onslaught of globalization. It is high time that labor unity is now taking shape and all of organized labor, including KMU and TUCP must rally round the initiative to strengthen labor power. ###
 

Imperialist globalization is the eve of socialist revolution

The workers of the world will celebrate International Labor Day this year with militant marches around the globe that is riding on the crest of an indisputable upsurge in the class struggle. The anti-globalization and anti-war movements are on course to blend into a powerful anti-imperialist and anti-capitalist struggle with the working class at its head.

The world is at a historical juncture with capitalist globalization writhing in a deep crisis and US imperialism launching wars of aggression. Since the eruption of the 1997 financial crisis, international capitalism has slowly but surely tumbled down to a long recession that is in danger of falling down the ravine of global depression. Its roots lie in the crisis of overproduction and overcapacity that is due to capitalism's fundamental contradictions.

With its powerful economy pummeled by the international crisis, US imperialism is provoking a conflagration of worldwide wars as it asserts its global domination over imperialist rivals and the Third World. With its appetite whetted by the occupation and colonization of Iraq, US imperialism is setting its sights on its next targets possibly in the Middle East like Iran or in Latin America like Columbia.

After less than a century, the wheels of history are coming round to a situation akin to the period of the two imperialist wars. Then, economic crisis and Great Depression led to two imperialist wars that ended with victorious anti-capitalist revolutions and anti-colonial struggles. Today, globalization is undoubtedly a period of crisis and war that will inevitably lead to revolution. The extraordinary rise of the anti-globalization movement after the Battle in Seattle and the unprecedented 
emergence of the anti-war struggle against the war on Iraq are a just the sneak preview of the momentous class struggles that will yet erupt in the first decade of the new millennium.

As sure as the sun rises in the east, so will the crisis mature, the situation deteriorate and the struggle escalate. History is marching with a faster beat as developments that were previously marked in years, now happening in just years, and years into months and months into days. All that is needed for a qualitative leap in the historical situation is the inspiring victory of a radical revolution such as the role played by the Russian Revolution of 1917. The single spark of a workers revolution will start a prairie fire of class struggle that is bound to end in the new socialist revolutions in the era of globalization. ###