Τhe Communist Youth Organizations of Europe that sign this text, on the occasion of the upcoming European elections, we address the youth of our countries that sees its life getting worse and its dreams getting crushed by the anti-people policy of the European Union and the governments.
The EU is a union of states that aims to serve the big capital, to assure the profits of the large European business groups by crushing the rights of the people and the youth.
The only acquis, which is so passionately being promoted by the EU and the governments, is the sacrifice of the workers for the competitiveness of the European market, its enlargement and the common currency.
The data is revealing
- 113 million people, namely 22.5% of the population lives below the official poverty threshold
- 12.5 million young people are in occupational mobility, neither working nor studying
- 10.2% of the school students drop out of school
- Education, Healthcare, Sports, Culture, everything is measured according to profit.
The EU is anti-people by its nature
The claims that the European Union can become pro-people are false. The EU cannot be humanized, it cannot be transformed into a Europe of the workers. The EU only changes for the worse for the peoples and the youth. Those parties that talk about the so-called democratization of the EU hide the fact, that in their countries they implemented or are still implementing the same anti-people policy, like all the governments of the EU. They do so, in order to fulfill the needs of the big capital of Europe in its competition with the economies of the USA, Japan, China, Russia and India on the grounds of capitalist economy.
The “freedoms” of the EU have been proved to be the freedoms of the business groups to maximize their profits, by intensifying in even more and more flexible ways the exploitation of the workers. The EU targets the youth, forming an even cheaper work force for the large companies, without labor, insurance and social rights, a work force that will even be moving from country to country. The “mobility” of the EU is basically the freedom of the entrepreneurs to transfer their production from one country to another one with cheaper work force, generally with better terms for their profitability, leaving behind queues of unemployed people. At the same time, the EU attempts through the “mobility” to foster illusions amongst the peoples that it is their “common home” which offers “employment opportunities” for everyone, hiding the fact that it is a wandering from country to country, from profession to profession, having as criterion the profitability of the business groups. A common home for the young people of the working and popular strata and the business groups cannot exist!
The ΕU proceeds rapidly with the abolition of the public character of universities by imposing tuition fees, by making students indebted because of loans and by reinforcing the intervention of the companies in education. It uses vocational training to form even cheaper employees, to adjust wages to low levels. It creates the “European Solidarity Corps” as a mechanism for the integration and participation of the young people under the terms of very cheap work force or even as volunteers, legitimizing unpaid work in various ways.
The EU means grave danger for the youth and the peoples
The unevenness and the imperialist interventions are in the DNA of the EU since its foundation as an inter-state, imperialist alliance. It conducts imperialist wars in cooperation with NATO, in the name of the false “export of democracy and values of the EU”. The EU considers NATO as a “basic pillar of the European Security”, it puts in danger the peoples of Europe by supporting the aggressive strategy of NATO for the encirclement of Russia. With massive armament based on the EU-Lisbon Treaty and the NATO target of 2% of state-budget for each member-state, the wars of tomorrow are being prepared at people’s expense. Meanwhile, it takes measures for its own independent action, reinforcing its aggression and militarization, creating rapid reactions forces for war operations, such as PESCO. Already in the European waters, refugees are drowning, the homelands of whom are being bombarded, while the majority of the survivors, who are not needed by the European labor market, are being piled up at hotspots.
The EU and the governments increase the repression of the workers’ - people’s movement, they intensify the surveillance in the name of fighting “terrorism and radicalization”. This anti-communist union of the capital criminalizes communist parties, their youth organizations and their symbols, while it supports governments that emerge with the support of fascist forces, such as the one in Ukraine. The historically unfounded equalization of fascism with communism is its official policy. This way it attempts to alter the content of the 9th of May, the Day of the Great Anti-fascist Victory of the Peoples against the Nazi beast, by naming it “Day of Europe”.
The EU is a sworn enemy of the struggle for the abolition of the exploitation of man by man, because that would also mean the end of the predatory alliance of the capital.
An end must be put to the Europe of unemployment, of the abolition of people’s rights and freedoms, of the profitability of a handful of exploiters. The way to the satisfaction of the contemporary needs of the youth and the people must be paved. In this beautiful struggle we communists call out to the young people of the working – popular strata to fight together with us.
For a Europe of the peoples and not of the capitalists
There is important experience that was unfortunately gained in the most tragic way for the people’s interests during the past years. The anti-people policy cannot be overthrown with the people on the sidelines, but through their rally with the communists in the struggle for stable work with rights, public and free Education, Health, Welfare, for the right in Sports, Culture, free and creative time, in rupture with the capitalist system. In the struggle against imperialist wars, interventions, for the right of the peoples to choose the path of development that they want. Only this struggle can fight nationalism, which, as long as the capital dominates, it will find ground to thrive on the basis of popular disappointment from the various scenarios of management of this rotten system.
The youth has to turn its back to the parties of the so-called “Euroscepticism” that do not fight against the unfair and exploitative capitalist economy and society, which is the reason why unions such as the EU exist. It must give a combative answer to the racist and fascist forces, which are utilized by the system as “watchdogs” against the workers’ movement.
We call out to the young people to massively support the action of the communist and workers’ parties in Europe that struggle against the EU, in view of the European elections in May, as well as in all the political battles that are ahead of us, for a society without exploitation of man by man, Socialism.
The 25 Communist Youth Organizations that sign the Common Appeal:
1. Communist Youth of Austria
2. Communist Youth of Belgium
3. Young Communist League of Britain
4. Young Socialists of the Socialist Workers Party of Croatia
5. Communist Youth Union - Czech Republic
6. Young Communists of Denmark
7. Communist Youth of the Communist Worker’s Party of Finland
8. Union of Communist Youth - France
9. Young Communist League of Georgia
10. Socialist German Workers Youth
11. Communist Youth of Greece
12. Workers’ Party Youth - Ireland
13. Conolly Youth Movement - Ireland
14. Front of the Communist Youth - Italy
15. Communist Youth Movement of the Netherlands
16. Youth of the Communist Party of Poland
17. Union of Socialist Youth - Romania
18. Leninist Communist Youth Union of Russian Federation
19. Revolutionary Communist Youth League (bolsheviks) - Russia
20. Young Communist League of Yugoslavia - Serbia
21. Collectives of Young Communists - Spain
22. Communist Youth Union of Spain
23. Communist Youth of Sweden
24. Communist Youth of Turkey
25. Leninist Communist Youth Union of Ukraine
