The PCP secretary general this Sunday called for the party to be strengthened to improve the living conditions of the Portuguese, saying that the “current path does not serve the country” and that it is necessary to “break with right-wing politics”. .
“Improving living conditions and a developed and sovereign Portugal are closely linked to the strengthening of the PCP. This is now becoming clear to more and more people”said Paulo Raimundo.
The communist leader was speaking at a session commemorating the centenary of the birth of artist and party activist José Dias Coelho, who died in 1961 when he was assassinated by the PIDE (the political police of the Estado Novo regime).
In the initiative, which took place at the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Lisbon, Paulo Raimundo believed that “today’s challenge is to break with right-wing politics and build a patriotic and left-wing alternative, respectful and the values materializing. of April”.
“This is the need of the country, which is proven every day when the problems increase, the living conditions of workers and the people in their rights to health, education, housing, culture deteriorate, when bottlenecks and national deep-seated problems, their structural deficits and their dependence at all levels is becoming more and more acute,” he defended.
And he pointed out that “there is the uncertainty, the low wages, the low pensions, the rise in the cost of living, there is the increase in the profits of economic groups, there is injustice and social inequality”.
“More than ever, the country needs a policy and a government based on the mobilization and participation of workers and the popular masses. The PCP is the bearer of the alternative and today, as in the past, is the fundamental element of the unity of the democrats, the alternative that confronts the right-wing policies and the reactionary and insidious projects that are being promoted,” the Secretary-General stressed.
Paulo Raimundo stated that, “one hundred years after the birth of José Dias Coelho and in the face of evidence that the current path does not serve the country”, the question that currently arises is whether one should “abandon command of collective life, as happens today, in the hands of economic groups, or take the destiny of our lives in our own hands, in the hands of the people and the country”.
José Dias Coelho was born on June 19, 1923 in Pinhel, Guarda district. He was a sculptor, draftsman and painter. He joined the PCP in 1947, after being a clandestine collaborator of the party, and joined the communist leadership in Lisbon, responsible for the intellectual sector.
José Afonso paid tribute to him in the song “A morte sau à rua”.
“José Dias Coelho’s life is an example of dedication, courage, commitment to the cause of workers and the people who honor us and whom we keep forever as a legacy of our collective struggle and the struggle of our people,” emphasized the Secretary General of the PCP in her intervention.
Paulo Raimundo also considered that the artist and communist militant “is a good example of the importance of collective work, discipline and revolutionary availability, of those who accepted to exchange a life full of promising hopes and professional perspectives to move from clandestine life to the overthrow fascism and defend the interests of our people”.
Source: DN
