This is a clever trick, since it will divert attention from discussions on the attacks on social security or on whether the PvdA should stay in government. Left, critical, or still socialist PydA members have the choice between two plagues: either to
NETHERLANDS / EL SALVADOR
"trust" Wim Kok, meaning that the PvdA
PRELIMINARY negotlations for a cease fire between the stays in government and ends up support-
Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN)' and the ing the latest attacks; or to withdraw sup-
Salvadoran government broke down over the summer of 1991, port for the government plans, and finish around the question of purging the government army. At the off the government with the risk of new elections in which the PdA might lose
Initiative of the Secretary General of the United Nations half its votes.
Organization (UNO), Carlos Perez de Cellar, a meeting was
How all this will end is not yet clear.
organized in New York on 16-17 September 1991 between
What is very clear however is that the
Salvadoran president Cristiani and some members of his
PdA seems ready to risk almost anything in order to stay in government. For Kok government and the five representatives of the FMLN in the the choice is simple. Either the PdA negotiations. To mark the occasion, the FMLN called a proves that it is a "loyal governmental parunilateral truce from September 13.
ty" in good times and bad. Or the party may break with the Christian democrats, as it did in 1982 after a big campaign by
PAQUITA GOMEZ the unions, led by Wim Kok himself, at that time the chair of the FNV, in response to an attack on the social security benefits of sick people by the late Joop den Uyl, at that time the leader of the PdA.
After that experience the PvdA was out of government for seven years and its leadership wants at all costs to avoid such a situation arising again as a result of this congress or as a result of a campaign by the unions. Unrest in the party and a (temthey hope loss of votes porary, are acceptable to them to avoid a break with the government.
PvdA opposition weak
The party congress can of course decide otherwise, but the opposition in the PvdA is politically and organizationally very weak. And the PvdA today has no alternative party leader available in case Wim
Kok feels the party does not "trust" him enough or takes decisions that he cannot work with.
As always the final outcome depends on the relationship of forces, on the real pressure that the mass movement can bring to bear on the government and on and in the
PydA, and on the relationship of forces between the trade union leaderships and combative sectors of the mass movement itself. It is therefore very important that the present campaign succeeds.
As in other countries, the workers movement in the Netherlands desperately needs more self-confidence and therefore new successful social struggles. The importance of the campaign goes beyond winning the concrete demands for which the fight has been launched. A massive campaign of strikes, demonstrations and other actions can prepare the ground for the new alignments, experiences and self- confidence that will be vital for the fight against the attacks of the coming years, including the consequences of the integration of capitalist Europe in 1992. *
N JULY and August 1991, the cease-fire negotiations broke down over a fundamental point: the need for a radical purge of the army and an end to its immunity - dramatically illustrated by the fact that the assassins of the six Jesuit priests at the University of Central America (UCA) in November 1989 are still unpunished?.
Nonetheless, a protocol indicating substantial agreement had been signed on April 27, 1991, between the government of the Alliance of National Reconstruction (the far right ARENA) and the FMLN, proposing the dissolution of the numerous forces of police repression (national guard, Hacienda police, and so on) and their replacement by a civilian national police; the submission of the army to the civilian government and a redefinition of its functions and powers; the independence of the judiciary and the nomination of a national attorney for human rights; and the setting up of a Commission of Truth, composed of independent personalities designated by the UN, charged with inquiring into violations of human rights since 1980.
United Nations observers arrive
Moreover, exactly one year after the signature of an agreement on human rights between the FMLN and the government, the team of UN observers for El Salvador (UNOSAL), charged with ensuring respect for human rights, was finally allowed to enter the country on July 26, 1991, despite the opposition of the army and the most reactionary sectors of the oligarchy.
The presence of this team of 90 people (50 civilians, 25 police functionaries and 15 soldiers), with a budget of $23 million, will perhaps have a restraining effect on the more barbarous human rights violations, but since its arrival it has been noted for its low profile.
Given the impasse in the negotiations and the army's rejection of a total demilitarization of the country, the FMLN now envisages, as the sole resolution of the armed conflict, a fusion of the guerilla forces and the governmental army, following a sweeping purge of the latter's high command, an important quantitative reduction of the two forces and a radical redefinition of the role of this new army, whose sole function would be territorial this perspective, the FMLN has renamed its guerilla forces the "National Army for Democracy" (END) and has reorganized it with a military command and ranks corresponding in all points to that of the governmental army.
In June 1991, Carlos Andres Perez, the social democratic president of Venezuela, proposed that the FMLN - on behalf of Perez de Cuellar's "club of friends" for El Salvador — unilaterally lay down its arms, in the virtual absence of any democratic guarantees in return.
The Cristiani government obviously leaped on this proposal, which was emphatically rejected by the FMLN. 1. The FMLN is a politico-military front, composed of the following forces: the Salvadoran Communist Party (PCS), National Resistance (RN), the Revolutionary Army of the People (ERP), the Revolutionary Party of the Central American Workers (PRTC), and the Popular Forces of Liberation (FPL). 2. Before the interruption of negotiations in mid-August 1991, US Secretary of State James Baker and his then Soviet equivalent, Alexander Bessmertnykh, jointly wrote to Perez de Cuellar, asking him to personally intervene - seeking thus to illustrate the "unfreezing" of East-West relations. 3. See /V 174 and 175. the head of the Saxica god monent is presidents and 1 1 the head of the Spanish government also participate.
International Viewpoint #213 • September 30, 1991
EL SALVADOR Faced with this pressure, responded with the slogan "If the armed forces want our arms, they have only to win the war", and launched a major offensive from the departments it controls
La Union, North Usulutlan, Cabañas and Chalatenango) in July 1991 — it claimed, at the end of July, to have inflicted 791 "losses" (dead and wounded) to the governmental army in the course of this month.
The army also launched several spectacular operations to attempt to "break" the morale of the FMLN; following the assassination, in April 1991, of FPL coman-
Jesus Rojas companions during an ambush at Chalatenango, the comandante of the PRTC was
This summer, given the refusal of the army to back down, the FMLN even floated the idea of a new far-reaching offensive of the November 1989 type, aimed at the relation of forces in its favour and relaunching the negotiations
Parallel to this, the spectre of a coup d'état by the most reactionary sectors of the army should not be excluded; but the United States (the principal backer of the Salvadoran government and army) is very much opposed to this, as it wants its model to maintain a certain legitimacy.
However the US' creature sometimes seems to escape its control; the Salvadoran army has become a true mafia, transforming El Salvador into a centre of the Latin American drugs trade following the dismantling of the Colombian networks; it takes rake offs from the smuggling which is endemic in the country; it blackmails industrialists to assure their protection and has even kidnapped some.
US Congress freezes aid
In 1990, following the massacres perpetrated by the army in November and December 1989, the United States Congress froze $42.5 million of aid to Salvador, but, on the insistent demand of Bush, it has just unfrozen $21.5 millions for "non-offensive" aid - between June 1990 and May 1991, the armed forces received $48 million of military aid.
Like the immense majority of the population, the guerilla combatants have had enough of the war, but they remain sceptical as to what can be negotiated with the "brutes" of the governmental army.
To break out of this impasse, some militants want the FMLN to launch a final offensive - but if the FMLN should take power, what could it make of its victory, solated in Central and Latin America.
with a US economic boycott, if not a direct military intervention, a virtual certainty? The problems experienced by Sandinista Nicaragua have given rise to much reflection. 12 society is fundamental to the negotiation If the question of the demilitarization of of a cease fire, once this first step is taken, the causes of the war in El Salvador will not for all that be resolved: the crucial question of agrarian reform, the genuine democratization of society, the impunity of the forces of repression, the right to work for all (unemployment now affecting more than 65% of the active popularesolve these problems, in the absence of a seizure of power by means of arms, the leadership of the FMLN wishes to secure, through negotiations, the opening of genuine political space for civil society, the mass movement and opposition (a constituent assembly, radio and television networks, trade union freeand so on which could lead towards a real change in society.
As José Diaz, a Jesuit at the University of Central America, puts it, El Salvador cannot achieve true democracy without social justice. Formal democracy exists already in terms of the institutions — division of powers, assembly, Supreme Court of Justice, and so on - but without a change of the relation of forces in favour of the people, all this will remain a dead letter.5 The FMLN wishes, for its part, to institute an economic, social and political sectors of the FMLN believe today that the seizure of power can be realized in a political manner, at the presidential elections of 1994 — in which the FMLN plans to run against ARENA, inside a broader political alliance than its current actual forces, in which the Democratic Convergence and some sectors of the Christian Democracy could partici-
Parallel to the maintenance of armed pressure, the FMLN is then preparing for participation in political and tary life — on July 29, 1991, comandante Shafik Handal, leader of the Salvadoran CP, announced in Mexico that preparations to transform the FMLN into a political party were underway, and that the organization would participate in the 1994 elections, even if the cease-fire were
To defeat the far right and its neo-liberal project in 1994, an alliance between the seems indispensable. For this, it will be necessary to define an economic and social project around which different and economic forces could Left parties increase share of
The legislative elections of March 1991 produced an important modification of the Salvadoran political panorama; the parties to the left of the Christian Democracy (DC) — notably the Democratic Convergence - obtained a significant percentage of the votes. On the other hand, the DC, which had not dared to ally itself with the Democratic Convergence, for fear of losing votes, received its lowest electoral score ever.
For the moment, the DC's priorities are electoral rather than political, and it is seeking the centre ground, placing itself above the ideological melee - but the space at the centre is growing increasingly
In the face of the hammer blows of the Cristiani government against the public sector and the agricultural cooperatives, there has been a radicalization of the National Union of Workers and Peasants (UNOC), the mass component of the DC. The leadership of this organization has recently, for the first time, called for the demilitarization of society, a theme dear to the FMLN.
As for the General Confederation of Labour (the CGT, the trade union federation linked to the DC), it has openly opposed extreme privatization. The free market programme of the government represents a frontal attack on the social base of the DC - the middle classes and
Today, the FMLN is strong enough to propose alliances and present pluralist and hegemonic positions. It already possesses a political structure in 12 of the 14 departments of the country. Contrary to the claims of the Cristiani government, the FMLN is more a political movement than a military organization: very many of its cadres will undoubtedly succeed in reintegrating themselves rapidly in civilian life and the mass struggle. Its political apparatus is very well structured; it already has more diplomatic representatives abroad than the Salvadoran government.
Models of alternative society constructed
If the perspective of the 1994 presidential election is important, the FMLN bases itself more on the conscious organization of the population against the ARENA regime, installing models of an alternative society in the zones it controls.
Since the signing of the 1987 Esquipulas Accords, the Salvadoran government has been obliged to allow the collective repatriation of the communities - essentially agricultural - which had fled the country during the great waves of repression in the years 1980-82.
These peasants, already well organized in the refugee camps in Honduras, Nicaragua or Panama, have returned to take possession of lands abandoned because of the conflict and establish "model" villages based on self-management.
Thus, for example at Nuevo Gualcho®, in the north of Usulutlan, 315 families repatriated from Honduras have functioned since March 1990 according to a system of combining family cultivation with a collective economy; half the land is divided individually according to the productive capacity of the families, and the
September 30, 1991 • #213 International Viewpoint remainder is cultivated collectively, the people working three days a week for the collectivity, and three days on their lands.
Nuevo Gualcho has already become selfsufficient, and is now trying to sell its surplus on the exterior market, to raise funds for the benefit of the community (construction of durable housing, development of the school and health centre, and so on).
Clothes, shoes and tin for the inhabitants are made in collective workshops.
The inhabitants are organized by sector of habitation and by sector of work, gener al management being the responsibility of a leadership of eight people, presided over by a woman; each leader is elected and recallable at any moment. The goal is to create a pole of development which can restimulate the will to organize in the neighbouring communities, whose inhabitants profit already from the health centre and school at Nue-
Of course, the authorities use all the means at their disposal to hinder these
"subversive" projects; the army harasses the communities on a virtually daily basis;
the government organizes the boycotting of the agricultural or artisanal products of the communities so as to financially strangle them; their schools and health centres are not recognized officially and receive no government aid, and so on.
Today, the FMLN is seeking to accelerate the repatriation of the communities exiled in Costa Rica or Belize, so that more of these symbolic projects can be launched. But, for the moment, communities like Nuevo Gualcho or Segundo
Montes (a community of 10,000 people repatriated in the Morazano) still depend entirely on the financial aid of foreign non-governmental organizations.
The FMLN can, at present, guarantee the safety of these "islands of socialism"
inside a country led by the oligarchy and the army, because of the relation of military forces and the presence of a structure like ONUSAL; its ultimate goal is to organize a significant sector of the population in this manner.
In the light of its perspective of a medium term cease fire, the FMLN has been preparing the demobilization of its combatants for a year now — it has even surveyed them to find out what they would like to do upon their return to civilian life.
The FMLN is aware that it has at its dispo-
Susted tiene problems sal a force which can play a very significant role in the rebuilding of the country and the revival of agricultural production (20% of Salvadoran territory is today completely deserted and in ruins); its army, disciplined, conscious and organized.
### Economic programme
Advised by European and Latin American economists and by Salvadoran academics, the FMLN has already sketched out economic programmes for non capitalist development on a national scale, envisaging, amongst other goals, the diversification of production beyond the traditional agro-export sectors of coffee, sugar and cotton, completely devalued on
Parallel to the movement of the repatriated communities, the popular peasant organizations are in the process of relaunching occupations of untilled land, faced with the incapacity of the goverment to resolve this crucial problem. They are also combatting the projects of ARENA, who wish to parcel out the lands distributed to cooperatives by the Christian Democratic government, under the demagogic slogan "All Salvadorans should become property owners".
Each stake is leased out for 30 years, but it is obvious that once the land of the cooperatives is divided, the peasants will be bankrupted in a few years and will be then expropriated ad hoc by the law -this measure seeks in fact to allow the big landowners to recuperate the lands which they had to give up during the agrarian reform instituted by the Duarte government. Beyond this, the government wish-
EL SALVADOR es to smash up what remains of collective organization in the countryside.
The peasant organizations have won some victories through these occupations, forcing some landowners to land. But, when this is not the case, the occupants are turfed out by the extremely violent interventions of the army and the
But the struggle in the countryside is not everything — the combination of the war and a "classical" rural exodus have meant that half the Salvadoran population now live in towns — the capital, San Salvador, now has 1 million inhabitants. A quarter of the inhabitants of the capital were affected by the earthquake of October 1986 (particularly the poorest layers); most of them have not been rehoused and shanty towns, without any health services. It was these marginal and precarious neighbourhoods that were hit hardest by the November 1989 offensive; the habitations were bombed then burned 5. As an example of how Salvadoran "justice" functions; in June 1991, a huge scandal shook the Salvado-
- 21 important industrialists (including two members of the President's family) were compromised in a major banking fraud involving $15 million. Despite warrants for their arrest, all the suspects had time to put their affairs in order and flee the country. 6. Democratic Convergence was created in 1988, following the retum from exile of the principal leaders of the Revolutionary Democratic Front (FDR), the political ally of the FMLN, and Guillero Ungo and Ruben amoral (MNR), which is linked to social democracy. It has supports the majority of the demands advanced by the 7. During the March 1991 general elections, the DC obtained 27.96% of the votes vote; ARENA 44.3%; the Party of National Conciliation (PCN, rightist) 8.9%; Democratic Convergence , 12.6% — against 3.8% in 1989; and the National Democratic Union (the legal formation of the CP) 2.7%. 1, 9.c Pensamieno Propio, no. 82, Managua, July 1 3
International Viewpoint #213 • September 30, 1991
EL SALVADOR to the ground by the army, leaving their occupants once again on the street.
Faced with this, the popular urban movements have organized occupations of land and have met violent repression. Thus, on August 9, 1991, in the neighbourhood of Soyapango, in San Salvador, the national police, the anti-riot brigades, the Hacienda police, the first artillery brigade and a unit of parachutists between 400 and 500 soldiers altogether - expelled a community of 300 families (1,800 people) which had occupied unused municipal land since March 1991, under the guidance of the Council of Marginal Communities (CCM).
Despite the presence of numerous Salvadoran human rights organizations, this expulsion was carried out in a military fashion, with tear gas and water cannons to convince the recalcitrant - seven members of the popular movement were moreover arrested and detained for several days. The members of this community have been "rehoused" in a totally unhealthy site on the outskirts of town.
The urban commandos of the FMLN responded immediately to this violent expulsion and growing property speculation — on August 12 and 14, construction sites in the residential quarters of San Salvador were blown up. Despite this incessant tension, the ARENA government seems to have gained some support among the population, particularly urban dwellers who have less access to the FMLN media?.
A major propaganda offensive presents the guerillas as dangerous terrorists, responsible for all the evils of the country. San Salvador is covered with publicity placards, where, next to a photograph of a young girl who has lost a leg, the message "FMLN, the children have had enough of your bombs" is written; there are also numerous posters advertising the "struggle against drugs with the army", and so on.
### Artificial growth rate
Beyond this, thanks to the colossal economic aid provided by the United States, and the repatriation of foreign currency by exiles ($550 million a year), the government has succeeded in maintaining an artificial rate of industrial growth. Thus, the standard of living of those who have a fixed job (barely 30% of the active population) is higher than in the neighbouring countries; a Salvadoran teacher earns $330, against $80 for a Guatemalan, although the cost of living is around 20% higher. This situation responds to the aspirations of the urban middle classes, who are precisely those who are exposed to the full flood of government disinformation - the newspapers close to the regime and the audiovisual media are full of edifying formulas on human rights violations by the "terrorists" of the FMLN, 14 and victorious army communiqués.
almost totally abandoned the countryside, the government is making strenuous efforts to transform the capital into a modern and luxurious shop window, with a profusion of commercial centres, chains of foreign restaurants, leisure parks, and so on. Despite this, the vigour of the popular movement is evident in the profusion of political and trade union graffiti throughout the town centre.
The November 1989 offensive was followed by significant repression against all the components of the popular movement. The most significant of these, the National Union of Salvadoran Workers (UNTS) which, since February 1986, has united nearly all the workers' and peasants' trade unions to the left of Christian Democracy, as well as organizations for the defence of human rights like COMADRES (which represents the families of the disappeared), has had nearly 1,300 militants arrested, around 80 murdered, and had to
Following this experience and the upheavals in Eastern Europe, this federation entered a period of reflection and elaboration, from which it concluded that the trade unions had neglected their role as bearers of the social and economic demands of the workers, instead defending exclusively political positions, and following too closely the line of the
To remedy this, the UNTS is now concentrating on the organization of general assemblies, sector by sector, to define the concrete demands of each category of workers, and find the best method of combatting the neo-liberal project of the goveverything nationalized by the DC.
Following the closure by government decree (against the will of the national assembly) of the Institute for the Regulation of Provisions (IRA) and the dismissal of its 1200 employees, the UNTS organized a demonstration of civil servants in San Salvador on August 12, 1991, which attracted 12,000 people from the capital and its periphery. The IRA, established by the Duarte government, existed to control prices and the distribution of basic food
After its election, the Cristiani government, partisans of the "free market" and of "laissez-faire", removed all the prerogatives of this organization, which rapidly became an empty shell, under the pretext of struggling against the corruption which prevailed under the rule of the Christian
This closure of a nationalized enterprise - which followed that of the Institute of Urban Housing (IVU), responsible for the construction of cheap housing prelude to the privatization of the majority of public services (telecommunicaeducation, and so on).
ARENA wishes to reduce the assets of the state to a minimum, in line with neoliberal conceptions but also so that, if the left is victorious in the 1994 elections, it will find itself in charge of the army and police alone. Privatization is also intended to concentrate power in the hands of the oligarchy and the army.
The demonstration of August 12, hailed as a success by wide sectors of the media, was followed by a general strike in the civ11 service on August 19, which was supported by 50-90,000 civil servants and municipal employees (the private sector employs less than 400,000 people). During this day of action, the centre of San Salvador was the scene of a rally at which the trade unions and human rights organizations explained the reasons for their
These two initiatives form part of a more global programme of struggle developed by the UNTS, which seeks to make the population aware of the problems posed by privatization; massive dismissals first, then higher prices for services which should be provided by the state - indeed the sale of certain sectors to US imperial-
The UNTS is also leading a campaign for the defence of the purchasing power of wages. ARENA has liberalized prices and suppressed the protectionism introduced by the DC (which was already far from adequate), and consumers now find themselves at the mercy of the manufacturers and the agricultural speculators.
In the past two years, the prices of milk, cooking oil, cereals and beans have doubled. The government technocrats claim, with the aid of a rigged price index, that inflation was only 23% in 1990, despite the increase in the price of petrol derivatives caused by the Gulf War10 - they argue that therefore wage increases are not
The FMLN knows that a military solution to the conflict which would be favourable to it is a more than improbable hypothesis. In addition to the tiredness of the people and even its own combatants, there is now an unfavourable regional and international context that has provoked numerous debates inside the Salvadoran revoltuionary movement. " In this context, the choice made by the FMLN, to encourage the development of the popular and trade union movement, is essential. The outcome of the negotiations with the government depends as much on the relationship of forces in the social and political domain as in the miltary field. In the eventuality of a cease-fire, the role of the mass movement would be still more deter9. According to a survey reported by the Bulletin of the ANN, number 246, July 17, 1991. 10. The Salvadoran army, preoccupied with its own battles at home, sent no troops to the Gulf, unlike its Honduran equivalent. But the Cristiani govemment generously offered the US Army the equivalent of $5 million of its best coffee to supply GI bases in Saudi