Bangladesh May 6th: Human Rights Watch Calls for Inquiry into Deaths, But Says ‘Genocide’ Claims Unfounded.

Al Jazeera reports,

Al Jazeera has obtained video footage suggesting that the Bangladesh government has been providing inaccurate death tolls from recent violence.

According to official figures, 11 people had died during fighting between police and protesters from Hifazat-e-Islam, an Islamic group, on May 6, a day protesters refer to as the “Siege of Dhaka”.

Human Rights Watch, a US-based rights group, said that the exact number of deaths resulting from the protests are “unclear”.

“Independent news sources put the figure at approximately 50 dead, with others succumbing to injuries later,” HRW said in a statement on Saturday.

In an interview with Al Jazeera, Bangladesh’s Foreign Minister Dipu Moni downplayed reports of inaccuracy in government figures.

Human Rights Watch says,

 The Bangladeshi authorities should immediately set up an independent commission to investigate the large numbers of deaths and injuries during the Hefazat-e-Islaam-led protests in Dhaka and elsewhere on May 5-6, 2013, Human Rights Watch said today.

The commission should also investigate violence that killed dozens in February, March, and April after protests and counter-protests broke out after the announcement of verdicts by the country’s International Crimes Tribunal (ICT).

The exact number of deaths during the May 5-6 protest remains unclear, with figures ranging from the official government figure of 11 deaths to Hefazat’s estimate of thousands. Independent news sources put the figure at approximately 50 dead, with others succumbing to injuries later. The dead include several security personnel.

“Bangladesh will see a plethora of demonstrations this year in response to additional verdicts from the ICT and in the run-up to national elections,” said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “Without an independent investigation, accountability, and improved policing methods, we could see serial bloodbaths.”

Human Rights Watch said that political tensions are likely to increase as more war crimes verdicts are handed down at the ICT and as elections scheduled for late 2013 or early 2014 approach. Opposition parties, including Hefazat, have already announced several protests scheduled over the next week. A flashpoint could be the reaction to the May 9 death penalty handed down by the ICT against Mohamed Kamaruzzaman, a leading official of the Jamaat-e-Islami party. Past war crimes verdicts have been a catalyst for protests and violence throughout Bangladesh.

Human Rights Watch called on opposition parties such as the main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and the Jammat-e-Islami Party, as well as independent organizations such as Hefazat, to condemn and take steps to deter their supporters from carrying out unlawful attacks, including on law enforcement officers or members of the public with different political views.

Human Rights Watch called on the government to publicly order the security forces to follow the United Nations Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials, which state that security forces shall “apply non-violent means before resorting to the use of force and firearms,” and that “whenever the lawful use of force and firearms is unavoidable, law enforcement officials shall: (a) Exercise restraint in such use and act in proportion to the seriousness of the offence and the legitimate objective to be achieved; (b) Minimize damage and injury, and respect and preserve human life.”

Section 22 of the Basic Principles states that: “Governments and law enforcement agencies shall establish effective reporting and review procedures for all incidents…Governments and law enforcement agencies shall ensure that an effective review process is available and that independent administrative or prosecutorial authorities are in a position to exercise jurisdiction in appropriate circumstances. In cases of death and serious injury or other grave consequences, a detailed report shall be sent promptly to the competent authorities responsible for administrative review and judicial control.” Section 23 states that, “Persons affected by the use of force and firearms or their legal representatives shall have access to an independent process, including a judicial process. In the event of the death of such persons, this provision shall apply to their dependants accordingly.”

“The Bangladeshi government has a responsibility to victims, whether protesters, bystanders or police, to ensure that an effective investigation is carried out into each death,” Adams said.

Hefazat, the conservative Muslim group that draws support from thousands of religious seminaries, led a “siege of Dhaka” on May 5, with demonstrations taking place in other parts of the country. Human Rights Watch said that claims of “genocide” by Hefazat and other opposition parties are unfounded and have only served to heighten tensions.

“The toxic swirl of rumor and rhetoric surrounding the protest of May 5-6 will only get worse unless the government acts quickly in a transparent manner,” Adams said. “Given the lack of trust between various parties, it is imperative that these answers come from an independent and impartial body.”

Human Rights Watch expressed concern that Hefazat recruited boys from madrassahs to participate in the “siege.” Many of the boys were unaware of the risks of marching into Dhaka. Independent journalists told Human Rights Watch that after the protests were broken up by security forces, they encountered groups of boys who had never been to Dhaka before and were terrified by the experience of seeing dead bodies and large-scale violence. The boys asked journalists for directions to bus stations so they could go home. They were no longer accompanied by adults.

Human Rights Watch called on the government to ensure media and civil society are able to independently report on the protests. Two television stations that support opposition political parties, Islamic TV and Diganta TV, were taken off the air by the government on the night of May 5-6 and remain off the air at the time of writing. The stations were reporting live from the site of the protests. In April, the government shut down opposition newspaper Amar Desh and jailed its editor, Mahmdur Rahman, and other journalists. The government has also jailed some bloggers who had expressed atheist sentiments in their writings.

“The government’s claims to be the most open and democratic in Bangladesh’s history are undermined by censorship of critical voices,” Adams said. “The government can take reasonab

This is what George Galloway said when calling for the overthrow of the Bangladeshi government last weekend ,

Galloway denounced the massacre of Islamic scholars earlier in the week.

“Even on the most conservative estimates of the number of people murdered, it exceeds the loss of life in 9/11,” said Galloway.

In total almost 3,000 people died in the 9/11 attacks.

Galloway Backs Efforts to Overthrow Democratically Elected Bangladeshi Government.

 

Galloway has marked a new step in his descent into support Islamist reaction,

Galloway calls for the peaceful overthrow of Bangladesh’s ‘gangster government’

“George Galloway last night called for the peaceful overthrow of the Sheikh Hasina/Awami League government in Bangladesh. Speaking at a huge protest rally in East London, Galloway denounced the massacre of Islamic scholars earlier in the week.

“Even on the most conservative estimates of the number of people murdered, it exceeds the loss of life in 9/11,” said Galloway.

“This is a game changer as the Americans would say. Bangladesh will never be the same again. This is the beginning of the end of this corrupt, murderous government.” He went on to deny there was now any possibility of free and fair elections in Bangladesh.

“Either they will be fixed by the government or they will be cancelled. That is why the only way we will get the change Bangladesh needs is through people power, a peaceful revolution that will remove this gangster government. The media is now under the almost total control of the Hasina government and in the West there has been an almost total media blackout about the massacre.”

Galloway added that the British-based Bangladesh TV had boycotted the rally and called on them to do their duty and tell the truth. “I’m against hanging anyone but it’s a fundamental truth in politics that those who live by the sword will die by the sword. There has to be an end of the politics of revenge.”

 

ibn muftishah sadr ‏@shahshuaibahmed10 May

@georgegalloway very powerful speech @ waterlilly regarding bangladesh crisis and showing your support.

I think we can guess what a bunch of far-right,  sectarian, racists Galloway addressed.

Galloway and Miliband: Worse than a Crime, a Mistake.

Galloway and Friend.

Galloway in Secret meeting with Miliband, the Mail reported on Sunday.

Phil in a quick response on A Very Public Sociologist unwisely commented,

It’s good politics to explore areas where some form of cooperation can be reached across party lines, even when a MP is from an organisation many times smaller than your own. And, needless to say, it is an utterly mundane and common occurrence. The only surprising thing about Ed and George’s meeting is that it hadn’t happened before now.

This led to the usual crew of pro-Galloway cretins (as one could politely call them), praising the Great Man whose immense political weight has been recognised at last.

Now in the  Guardian Mark Ferguson of Labour List comments,

There’s been a certain amount of (entirely justifiable) anger and confusion from many Labour supporters today at reports in the Mail on Sunday that Ed Miliband met George Galloway in his Westminster office recently. The spin from the Mail – to the surprise of no one at all – was that “Red” Ed Miliband was attempting some form of reconciliation with George Galloway, in an attempt to have him rejoin the Labour party.

Thankfully, this is not the case.

A senior source in Miliband’s office told me this afternoon that this was “certainly not about reconciling with Galloway”, while another told me that “there is no possibility, prospect or chance of George Galloway rejoining the Labour party”. Allowing him to rejoin the party would happen over my dead body – and I suspect a substantial proportion of the party membership feel the same way.

In fact, the meeting was about a rather more prosaic – but crucial – matter: the boundary changes vote that at the time looked like it might come down to just one or two votes. All parties in parliament (except the Tories) were approached, and it paid dividends as the boundary changes fell. A Labour party spokesperson confirmed that this afternoon, saying:

“There is no attempt to bring George Galloway back into the Labour party as many of his views are unacceptable and extreme. Ed met him purely as a courtesy to discuss the recent vote on changing parliamentary boundaries. No communication has taken place since.”

Now  this is may well be a matter of winning a “crucial Commons vote” .

But why on earth did Miliband have to talk face to face with Galloway?

One can imagine that Galloway is chuffed.

We will no doubt learn more, from other sources if not directly from  North Korea’s greatest friend’s own foam speckled mouth.

On this meeting one could say, “”C’est pire qu’un crime, c’est une faute!”

SWP Crisis: Anna Chen, Nick Cohen, Women, Jews and the Legacy of Beyond the Fragments.

Relevant Reading for Today.

In the Observer Nick Cohen writes,

The far left cannot face up to rape and its ignorance is killing it. The willingness to excuse the humiliation of women has already destroyed the reputations of Julian Assange and George Galloway. Now it is destroying the Socialist Workers party, which is not only Britain’s largest Marxist-Leninist group but the most unscrupulous gang of hypocrites I have ever met.

Cohen cites comrade Anna Chen,

Anna Chen saw the misogyny up close. She stopped working as a comic and poet in the early 2000s to devote every waking hour slaving for the Socialist Alliance, Stop the War and other SWP front organisations. “Because the revolution comes first, human beings are just disposable,” she told me. “I was struck by how sexless and ugly the leading men in the SWP were. But they always had women. If you slept with one of them, they promoted you. It was as basic as that.”

He then launches into a no-holds barred attack on the ‘Marxist-Leninist’ left.

This term is usually reserved for Maoists, or at a pinch, orthodox Communists.

Cohen implies that the ‘M-L’ model is held by a very diverse collection of groups and individuals to the left of the Labour Party.

This is not only false, but ‘Marxist-Leninists’ are today the fringe of the fringe of the fringe.

Commenting on those in the SWP who have had the bottle to stand up and be counted, he says,

But for all its naivety, the assault on left misogyny remains an optimistic moment and not only because you should always listen to people who stand on principle, however belatedly. The far left isn’t a separate entity. It is a fairground mirror that reflects the faults of the liberal mainstream in grotesque forms. If even the brainwashed minions of the SWP can rebel, maybe one day timid liberals will find the courage to condemn a “liberal” legal system that, for reasons of political correctness, has failed to prosecute a single case of female genital mutilation.

Attacking – rightly – George Galloway and Julien Assange is on thing.

But the assumption that the SWP Central Committee “is misogynist and anti-Democratic” and that this is  representative of  the rest of the ‘far-left’ is false.

And what ‘distorted mirror’ of liberalism is that?

The kind that shows a thin man fat, that is its opposite?

This charge – flatly – just not apply to many members of the SWP.

It is, to say the least, completely wrong about the left as a whole.

If there is something we share with liberalism it is democracy, which we claim to support more consistently than many of them.

Democracy is in our blood and our blood is up!

Anna Chen: Things not Treasured by the SWP.

Anna Chen’s assesment  of the SWP (essential reading) shows exactly how democratic socialists think and act,

When you treat human beings as disposable things in the name of la causa, when appropriation of activists’ labour and good will is the norm, when exploitation of your own side goes unchallenged, sexual abuse is one probable outcome.

She offers an insight into how the SWP operates.

On the most important initiative of the Socialist Alliance Anna notes,

When a Jewish socialist group requested platform time to speak against the war, they were refused on the grounds that their presence would alienate Muslims. The guy who’d made their case protested and was told that “you people” were “too sensitive.” I was banned from doing the press on the day but went ahead and worked from home, getting Bianca Jagger and Americans Against the War followed on the march by ITN, doing what I’d been doing all along … Oy veh, it got FUGLY.

That huge demo was built on the spine of the SA and yet the SA chair was denied a place on the platform while Lib Dem Charles Kennedy was welcomed with open arms … and then promptly supported “our boys” once action started. And where’s it all gone, anyway? If the SWP, Counterfire and STWC claim 1 to 2 million were on the march, then they have to give a good account of where they’ve all gone, ’cause it’s not into the left movement.

Who needs this crap?

I know the comrade who made the suggestion to invite the Jewish Socialist Group (and the partner of the then Chair of the Socialist Alliance).

He also described to me  how hard it had been to get a condemnation of the 9/11 murders out of the STWC – it was like wrenching a tooth out.

Anna describes the formation of Respect,

Head honcho took an axe to the Socialist Alliance to get into bed with the Birmingham mosque and then Respect. Then he did … er … more stupid things in Respect and, several years after I’d pointed out some questionable behaviour and been stuffed for it, he and his mates had to leave the SWP to form Crossfire or Counterfire, whatever the splinter’s called. But I get ahead of myself. And the class should never be premature for then down comes the big Monty Python foot.

Head Honcho, John Rees, and the SWP’s  strategy has been described by Tendance Coatesy in Chartist Magazine in 2008.

Detractors were not slow to point out the faults of Respect, or Galloway’s sulfurous and erratic reputation. The SWP’s political culture – described as permanent hysteria and disregard for democracy – particularly irked. Complaints rested on the conflict between the SWP’s version of Leninism, and democratic practice. The Party claimed it was in a ‘united front’: it, the ‘revolutionary’ element, allied on equal terms with those who opposed racism, exploitation and war. In reality the leadership took decisions with other notables, Galloway to the fore, above the membership’s heads.  On a range of issues, from calling feminism a ‘shibboleth’ to downgrading LGTB rights, to opposition to secularism, Respect alienated the left.

I went onto make this observation.

A real bone of contention was Respect’s description of itself as ‘the party of Muslims’. In their dash for electoral gain the party had compromised with the Islamicist bullies described by Ed Husain in The Islamicist (2007). De facto alliances, now admitted by the SWP, had been forged with right-wing Islamicists, such as supporters of the reactionary Jamaat-i-Islami party present in the East London Mosque. Secular Bangladeshis were not slow to point to the bloody role the Jamaat played in opposing independence and suppressing the left in their country. Communalist appeals led to a growing electoral rival amongst Afro-Caribbean voters in the East End, the Christian People’s Alliance. Salma Yacoob associated with Birmingham mosques that played host to ultra-conservative preachers.

Any attempt to oppose this approach was met with cries of ‘Islamophobia’. In municipal politics Respect increasingly relied on ‘community leaders’ (including wealthy businessmen) of a Muslim background (Bangladeshi in East London, Pakistani in Birmingham) rather than socialists or trade unionists. Nor was this the only difficulty. Their councillors often operated as councillors frequently do: vying for position, and standing up for ‘their people’ first, squabbling, switching sides, and puffing themselves up, regardless of their party’s instructions.

Anna concludes,

We need a strong left that is able to counter the coalition’s attacks on the working and middle classes that are looking like something out of the Enclosures. However, like anyone else who ever looked at the disgusting state of the world and wanted to do something about it, I never signed up for SWP abuse and I certainly never signed up for their omerta that they go around imposing on errant former members on pain of The Treatment. It is important that this stuff gets aired for so many reasons. If they can’t, after all this grief, look at themselves honestly, then they deserve everything they’re getting. And the working class is better off without them.

More on this (2003) by Anna here.

Feminism: Leading the Fight for Democracy.

Which brings me to  Beyond the Fragments: Feminism and the Making of Socialism. Sheila Rowbotham  Lynne Segal and  Hilary Wainwright (1979,  reprinted in book form in 1980).

This book had an immense influence on the left (my close comrades were deeply affected, amongst thousands of others) during the late 1970s.

In my circles I, and others, were involved in,  from the International Marxist Group (not least because Hilary had been a member)  to Big Flame and other libertarian Marxist and – also- anarchist, groups, its impact was immense. The SWP even had, briefly, its own women’s paper, Women’s Voice. This extended right to the Labour Party and the Communist Party of Great Britain.

The Women’s movement had already become extremely important, campaigns on abortion rights and gay rights were only amongst many grass-roots based activities that corresponded to a flourishing network of women’s groups.

But Beyond the Fragments was perhaps the most directly political contribution to the left-wing politics.

It brought, or rather helped bring,  feminism ideas into the heart of  left, not without resistance from old established left group’s leaderships.

Sheila Rowbotham  began by saying,

I want to begin to explore the challenge I think the women’s movement is making to the prevailing assumptions of how revolutionary socialists should organize. These involve how theory is conceived, how the· political organization sees its relationship to other movements, how consciousness is assumed to change, how the scope of politics is defined, how individual socialists see themselves and their relationship to other people, now and in the past.

She described the  feminist movement as follows,

Our politics have tried to allow expression of vulnerability and openness to every woman’s feelings which consciousness raising at its best implies. We have rejected central organization, hierarchical structures and a leadership. This has not meant that we have no organization, for example, regional networks, women’s centres, conferences, publishing groups, theatre groups, folk and rock bands, film collectives, trade union caucuses, food co-ops are aspects of the women’s movement. The structures which have arisen have been seen as serving particular needs. The making and communication of ideas have been an extraordinary collective process in which thousands of women have contributed. The organizational initiatives which have been spread through the movement have been extremely diverse, involving women in quite different ways. The women’s movement has touched many areas of politics socialists have neglected and its hold goes deeper. It absorbs more of your being.

Her comments  on the International Socialists (IS – forerunner of the SWP) seem relevant today.

My real involvement was with the emerging Women’ Liberation Movement but this closeness to IS meant I was forced to try and understand the leadership’s resistance in the early 1970s to discussing aspects of oppression which were not directly related to class exploitation. I went to the first IS women’s conference as an observer and identified strongly with the women arguing for women’s liberation. It was a particularly confusing situation because many of the first women’s groups outside London were started by women in or close to IS.

At first it seemed enough to put resistance to women’s liberation down to the bias of a male-dominated leadership – though the picture was never that simple as some women in IS opposed women’s liberation and some men supported it from the beginning. The effort to change the direction of IS and orientate towards working-class economic struggles also certainly contributed towards a dismissal of women’s liberation as middle class – the pot being disposed to call the kettle black. But by the mid seventies neither of these seemed adequate explanations for the greater overt sectarianism shown by IS than by the Communist Party or the International Marxist-Group to the women’s movement.

The reader of this can see: the SWP’s sexism has long-standing roots .

When we look at the anti-democratic  way the Central Committee  functions, this is also not new.

Rowbotham says,

In its early days IS really did try and break with sectarian traditions and with the windbag rhetorical rituals on the left. But this hardened into a refusal to talk about the politics of what they were doing within the left. Martin Shaw has described how IS members came to feel they were above sectarianism. But the refusal to deal with dogma meant that in trying to go outwards they dismissed other socialists. In rejecting some of the obvious pretentions of orthodox Trotskyism, righteousness grew within.

It was as if they had a special calling which was never stated and was somehow invisible. Their politics became those of a chosen elect. They could never do everything themselves hut felt no one else could be relied upon to do anything worthwhile. Under this strain their ideas were held in abeyance. There was no time to learn from new developments. Increasingly their theories did not fit new realities outside IS so they stiffened into dogma and became defensive. Ideas and open debate became almost suspect as inherently middle class. They seemed to be regarded as a waste of time with ‘the Crisis’ upon us. The instinct towards criticism was to attack the opponents for their class or lack of activity. Paranoia mounted as secret internal documents inevitably leaked. If the circumstances of the mid seventies could produce this change, the mind boggles at what a civil war and famine would have done – Uncle Joe apart.

The SWP are Bourbon Socialists.

As  Talleyrand is said to have remarked of Bourbon dynasty:  “ls n’ont rien appris, ni rien oublié  (They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing).

It may be that some things have indeed been forgotten.

But what have the SWP  learnt from the 1970s and 1980s debates on feminism and democracy?

Absolutely nothing.

Update: This, The SWP crisis: some reflections is very much worth reading.

SWP, Callinicos Wrong On Nouveau Parti Anticapitaliste.

For the SWP the French Nouveau parti anticaptialiste (NPA) has been a reference point.

While recognising its strengths there have long been criticisms of its internal regime.

This  allows ‘factions’, tendencies and ‘courants‘ to operate. This is not a grudging ‘right to dissent’.  NPA’s Conferences are organised around motions from these groups, or alliances – a practice similar to the internal functioning of the  French Parti Socialiste.

In a long article last year  analysing the marginalisation of the NPA and its coming break-up (France: anti-capitalist politics in crisis International Socialism Issue: 134  Alex Callinicos observed the problems raised by the NPA’s priorities.

Firstly, “The problem is that the NPA’s political life is centred on elections.”

Unlike the SWP whose interest in electing George Galloway in the East End was purely marginal…

Secondly, “the idea that political organisations should respect the “autonomy of the social movements”.

This contrasts with the SWP’s practice of tactical “united fronts” – that is, working with social movements (pressure groups or campaigns) for a short while to organise demonstrations and other protests, and then dropping them in an endless cycle of ‘front-recruitment-new front’. This behaviour has caused great resentment amongst other activists.

The LCR/NPA enjoys a different legacy:  enduring respect from activists and social movements.

But the worst fault of the NPA was this.

 a third weakness carried over into the NPA from the LCR, namely an internal regime of institutionalised factionalism. There are, of course, longstanding differences over how best to organise democratic centralism. The SWP has, for more than 40 years, insisted that political disagreements should be allowed to crystallise into formally organised factions only in the period of internal debate before a party conference. The LCR and its sister sections of the FI have, by contrast, long maintained the right to organise permanent tendencies. In the Ligue this meant that internal discussion was for a long period of structured by a permanent debate between a “majority” that was itself a coalition and the grouping around Picquet.

Callinicos attended the 2011 NPA Congress,

Comrades in the FI sometimes criticise the SWP internal regime for being too homogeneous and dominated by the Central Committee, but, particularly in recent years, there has often been great uncertainty about the outcome of important votes at SWP conferences.

By contrast, he argues, the NPA’s votes were known in advance.

That is because the entire membership had voted beforehand on what they supported and it was not left to the mandated delegates to decide!

At the 2011 congress the Conseil National Politique, the NPA’s leading body, was selected by representatives of the different platforms reading out lists of their supporters to occupy places allocated thanks to their share of the membership votes. At the best of times this kind of setup inhibits real debate, where minds can be changed thanks to the play of argument. But this has not been the best of times for the NPA. With no faction having a majority, the field is open for manoeuvres and bargains

Alex Callinicos now says (Socialist Review)

The New Anticapitalist Party (NPA) in France imploded in 2011-12, leading to a very serious breakaway to the Front de Gauche led by Jean-Luc Mélenchon. This has weakened the far left in Europe, and indeed the rest of the world. The implosion was caused by political differences and setbacks, but it was exacerbated by an internal regime very similar to the one advocated by some SWP members. All the debates within the NPA went through the filter imposed by the struggle between four permanent factions. Members’ loyalties focused on their factional alignments rather than the party itself.

In reality there has been no such things, outside of tiny irrelevant groups like Clarté, as permanent factions in the NPA with their own special interests.

The first faction to leave the old LCR, just as the NPA was founded, is best known for  Christian Picquet . In June 2006 he backed a motion in favour of uniting all candidates to the left of the Parti Socialiste. It got 40% of the votes at the Conference. This tendency received 14% at the last NPA Conference. In other words its actions and its ‘loyalties’  were always part of the flow of debate, and axed towards the general needs of the party. It is now the Gauche Unitaire (formed 2009) and an integral part of the Front de gauche.

Most importantly the former ‘majority’ exploded in 2011.

• The new majority defending the Candidature of Philippe Poutou  in the forthcoming (2012) Presidential elections.
• The other arguing in favour of the  Front de gauche.

Of the latter Convergence et Alternative joined the Front de gauche in 2011 in advance of the Presidential election in 2012.

In April 2012  for the First Round of the French Presidential election the NPA’s Phillipe Poutou got 1,15 %  of the vote (411 160).

The Front de Gauche candidate, Jean-Luc Mélenchon,  got 11,10 % of the vote  (3 984 822).

This undercut the original NPA view that “there is nothing on the left between us and the Parti Socialiste”

Most of the remaining opposition, in the Gauche ant,icapitaliste,   joined the Front de gauche in July  2012.

This account of voting figures from LCR/NPA Congresses do not suggest rigid ‘faction’ behaviour. They indicate a great deal of flexibility,  strategic differences and changing allegiances.

They imply a ‘loyalty’ to tendencies, a condition of developing their analyses for Conference resolutions, and deepening their views. But not blind faith in a mini-leadership.

The NPA’s tendencies and factions  act indeed as a “permanent” democratic control over the party.

The internal structure cannot be blamed when, on an important issue, participation in the Front de gauche, the minority  left.

The political disagreement was simply too great.

There have been none of the psychodramas we see in the present SWP crisis.

What Callinicos is complaining about is democracy.