Protest against the state persecution of a Czech left-wing youth organization

On October 16, 2006 The Czech Interior Ministry decided to dissolve the left-wing Communist Youth Union (Komunistický svaz mládeže, KSM), which is connected to the Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia (KSČM, reformist parliamentary party with 12-20% electoral support). The so-called “reason” for the dissolution of this youth organization was one passage in their program which calls for “changing the private ownership of the means of production into social ownership of these means in the period after the social revolution”. This formulation was declared unconstitutional by the Interior Ministry.

This isn’t the first time the Czech state has tried to ban the KSM. The Interior Ministry (then headed by the social democrats) made the first attempt in November 2005 – at that time they used excuses about political activities “inappropriate to associations except political parties” and about the KSM’s supposed focus on “violent revolution”. At the time, he KSM obviated the ban by changing a formulation about the “overthrowing of capitalism” into the “overcoming of capitalism”.

This time, the Interior Ministry (now headed by the right-wing party ODS) didn’t give any warning about the decision to dissolve the KSM.

This, as well as a previous state attacks against the KSM, is not an accidental or isolated decision. The KSM has for a long time been the biggest left-wing youth organization in the Czech Republic. The ban comes at a time when the KSM has actively participated, together with other organizations, in the campaign against planned US military bases in the Czech Republic. The KSM collected the majority of the tens of thousands signatures against the bases. The decision came only four days before the Senate and municipal elections, in which the KSČM is participating.

The KSM, the KSČM and other left-wing political organizations (including REVOLUTION Czech Republic) have recently been the victims of more and more anticommunist attacks, by private and public media as well as by politicians, especially two Senators, J. Štětina and M. Mejstřík, who launched an initiative for the total ban of both the KSM and the KSČM. The Czech left is threatened by “respectable” organizations which produce T-shirts with slogans like “Kill a communist – reinforce peace!”, but also by physical attacks of anticommunists, like the attack before the parliamentary elections against a well-known KSČM representative, J. Dolejš.

The decision of Czech state isn’t just an attack on one left-wing organization – it is an attack against everyone who is against the policies of neoliberalism, who openly protests against the wars of the world’s rulers and who recognizes that another society is possible through the collective revolutionary action of the international working class. It is message from the ruling class, with the aim to threaten and silence all critics of the capitalist system of exploitation, oppression, poverty and war. It shows the hypocrisy of the “democracy” introduced in the Czech Republic after the collapse of Stalinism in 1989 – bourgeois democracy offers freedom for the bourgeoisie, but for the working class and the youth it offers only repression and exploitation.

We disagree with the KSM on many points, however we strongly condemn all state and anticommunist attacks against them as well as against any part of the left.

The iRevo tendency therefore stands in full solidarity with KSM. We protest loudly against their persecution and supports KSM legal activities against the ban. For an effective international campaign, we need an international organization which can unite the struggles of the youth for their rights across all borders – a revolutionary youth international!

The iRevo tendency calls on all left-wing organizations, especially youth organizations, for a common condemnation of the ban and for public protests in front of Czech institutions everywhere on the world.

Hands off the KSM!

iREVOLUTION, November 4, 2006