1. The Central Committee of the KKE addresses a call to the working class of the country, the urban and rural self-employed, the tradesmen, the craftsmen, the scientists, the farmers, the youth studying at higher and secondary education, and the women from popular families.

We call upon them for a decisive, mass, and unyielding struggle to defend their lives, their living standard, and their income; for a decent life with contemporary rights; for a future free from today’s insecurity and uncertainty.

Now is the time for the people to show their power.

Indignation and anger must be turned into organized struggle.

We call upon them to reject the “wait-and-see” approach. Nothing good is going to come out of the movements, manoeuvres, and choices made by the ruling class and its political personnel to channel popular discontent.

The people can and must become the protagonists of the developments! This can be achieved through a united nationwide struggle, with preparation and organization from below; through seedbeds of resistance and fronts of struggle in every sector, workplace, place of education, city, neighbourghood, and village. With a view to meeting at the nationwide rallies, at the militant and mass strikes of the coming period.

The ever-growing popular anger must not be channeled into a passive waiting stance due to the imminence of the parliamentary elections. The people must not be entrapped in the fake dilemmas and confrontations of minor importance between the political parties of the establishment. Α change of an anti-popular government alone is not enough because it is going to be replaced by another one that will continue serving the demands of the big capital and fulfilling the commitments to the EU and the USA–NATO. We have experienced all this before.

What is needed today for the rebirth of hope and optimism is a new, militant beginning, with a strong KKE at the forefront, against energy poverty and high prices; against the so-called green transition marked by the energy exchange, the heavy taxation, and environmental destruction; against the imperialist war and Greece’s multifaceted involvement in it; against the NATO–EU plans that the people pay dearly for, today with the military expenditure and in the future with the blood of their children.

It is urgent to strengthen the militant spirit within the working class and the entire people by joining forces with the KKE. This will also be reflected in a change in the political correlation of forces everywhere: from the first-level trade unions and associations to the parliamentary elections, which will be held by early summer 2023 at the latest, and the municipal and regional elections, which will be held in October 2023.

Only the people can save the people in the struggle for the overthrow of capitalism and that is why we need a much stronger KKE.

2. We are going through critical times. The imperialist war in Ukraine is raging.

The Russian Federation’s annexation plans of the conquered territories on the one hand and the multifaceted support —even with heavy weaponry— provided by the Euro-Atlantic camp to the reactionary Zeleskiy government on the other, are fueling the vicious circle of imperialist competition and war.

This has culminated in threats by both sides to use nuclear weapons. In these circumstances, the demand for Greece to be disengaged from the war and for an end to be put at the transformation of the Greek territory and infrastructure into a launching pad for war becomes imperative. The sabotage of the Nord Stream pipelines and other crucial infrastructure confirms this necessity.

At the same time, there are new hotbeds of tension and imperialist competition between the Euro-Atlantic (USA– NATO–EU) and the emerging Euro-Asian (China–Russia) centre. An integral part of this competition is also the deterioration in Greek-Turkish relations, with the escalation of aggression on the part of the Turkish ruling class. NATO’s pursuit to draw Turkey away from Russian influence —for the sake of NATO cohesion— is bound to fuel negotiations and confrontations to the detriment of the Greek and Turkish peoples as well as the sovereign rights of our country.

The storm clouds of a new capitalist economic crisis are gathering over the EU.

Governments, international organizations, bourgeois political parties, and the media are preparing the peoples for the “harsh winters” to come.

They talk about an “extraordinary situation” and “conditions of war”. They present dystopian images that include “severe energy shortages”, “food rationing”, “soaring prices”, “generalized poverty”, “dark cities”, and “cold homes”.

However, all these are neither “natural phenomena” nor the result of a “bad conjunction of events”; they are not simply a “deviation from normality to which we will eventually return”, as they say.

Behind all popular problems including poverty, high prices, war, and even repression and phone-tapping scandals, lie the very same causes, namely:

- The policy pursued by all bourgeois governments, which sacrifices the popular needs on the altar of capitalist profit. Besides, the “harsh winter” will not affect us all equally. At the same time that the popular households struggle to make ends meet, the business groups in the sectors of energy, transport, food, medicine, tourism, etc. report record-breaking profits.

- The vast impasses and insurmountable contradictions of the capitalist path of development, whose sole objective and motive is profit.

- The “normality” of a state that shields the dictatorship of capital to confront the enemy, that is the people, at a time of a flare-up of popular anger.

Naturally, they conceal and will never admit the real causes for the great contradiction of our times: in modern capitalist societies, despite the immense scientific and technological achievements and the ever-growing wealth, the peoples are condemned to live in conditions of previous centuries.

All in all, the era is not menacing; capitalism makes it menacing for the people.

This system cannot be fixed, improved or humanized. All developments vindicate the KKE, which proclaims that capitalism is the enemy of the peoples and that the only salvation lies in the struggle for its overthrow.

3. In the face of this gloomy situation, the struggles and mass demonstrations of workers in many countries around the world are a glimmer of hope and optimism. They take place against the war and the involvement in it; against the excessive military armaments; against the consequences of energy poverty and high prices; against the effort to shift the burden of the war, the reciprocal sanctions, and the multifaceted support for capital onto the workers.

The staffs of the system are concerned that popular anger might take on a radical content and orientation. The difficulties faced by more and more governments —centre-right, centre-left, liberal, social-democratic, etc.— demonstrate that the contradictions are sharpening, that we are in a state of flux, and that they are not omnipotent after all. On the contrary, conditions can be created that will shake the power of capital, with the proviso that the peoples should trust in their own strength and utilize these difficulties to their advantage and that they should not support stopgap solutions in order to alleviate the barbaric system once again.

The discussion that is being held in Greece as well about the so-called political stability ―regardless of how each bourgeois party interprets and pursues it― mainly aims at the smooth implementation of the anti-popular policy. It is the other side of the coin of repressive and authoritarian measures to manipulate the people. It means stability for capital but instability and insecurity for the people.

Despite the sharpened confrontation and the heated debates, the ND government as well as SYRIZA, PASOK/KINAL, and the other parties are of one mind about the objective of “stability” for the profits of capital and compete over who can most successfully safeguard it. They talk about the need to “secure social cohesion” and “avoid tensions”.

ND serves this goal through the pursuit of a one-party majority government and its hard line on the people. SYRIZA does so through the well-known and bankrupt formula of the so-called “democratic governments”, which, wherever they come to power, follow the same path that leads to high prices, poverty, and the risk of war. PASOK/KINAL is supported by centres of the economic and political establishment as a “wild card” for future anti-popular governmental solutions.

However, the programme of the government of the day, regardless of its name or composition, is already known.

‣ It is a programme that will continue the policy that turns energy into an extremely expensive commodity in the framework of the “liberalized” market. It will continue implementing the strategy of the so-called green transition and the “energy liberalization”, which is the basic cause of energy poverty and already existed before the war broke out. Besides, the ND and SYRIZA governments shut down and degraded domestic productive units such as lignite plants. They introduced the emissions trading, the energy exchange, the “green” taxes, and the adjustment clauses in electricity bills. The people are and will continue paying an expensive energy mix based on imported natural gas and the even more expensive US liquefied natural gas (LNG).

‣ It is a programme that will perpetuate high prices, which are a consequence of the sanctions against Russia and result from the so-called outward-oriented policy that sets the prices of domestic products based on the international market, as well as the notorious expansionary policy. All the above have come on top of the crushed workers’–people’s income by the memoranda policy, which is continuously enriched with new anti-labour laws.

‣ It is a programme that will implement the commitments to the EU and the Recovery Fund. The celebrations for the “exit from enhanced surveillance”, which allegedly marks the end of the memoranda period, are a deception! Not only because the unbearable burden that has fell on the Greek people during the past decade still remains intact but also because the notorious “EU normality” is accompanied by permanent commitments and control mechanisms. We are bound by the prerequisites of the Recovery Fund, which is the new “super-memorandum” against the peoples of Europe in the “extraordinary situation” that arises from the war and the upcoming crisis, with the peoples being the victims.

‣ It is a programme that will implement the commitments of the Greek state to NATO and the EU as well as the military agreements with the USA, France, etc. These are commitments in favour of the interests of the Greek capital, which, through the role of the flag bearer of the dangerous military plans, seeks its geopolitical and economic enhancement. Owing to these commitments, the Greek territory has been turned into a US–NATO launching pad and will become a target of retaliation in the case that the imperialist conflict is generalized. They have made Greece a champion in military expenditure for NATO’s needs, passing the bill on to the people. In the context of these commitments, the sovereign rights of our country against the aggression of the Turkish state are not safeguarded; on the contrary, they are undermined. NATO and the EU pave the way for a possible conflict between Greece and Turkey and a compromise to the detriment of Greece’s sovereign rights, under the auspices of the Euro-Atlantic forces.

This common strategic base prepares the ground on which various scenarios are been developed about a “multiparty government”, a “national unity government” or even a “wider coalition government” with the participation of technocrats, if dictated by the need to maintain the stability of the system.

The false dilemmas that arise during the pre-election period solely aim at concealing reality by setting new traps and blackmailing the people.

The ND threatens the people with the possibility of a “political monstrosity” (Note: That is how the Prime Minister K. Mitsotakis described the proposal put forward by SYRIZA concerning a coalition government), which it allegedly seeks to prevent from being formed. SYRIZA promotes the same old story of the so-called progressive or democratic governments that will restore “EU normality” that is supposedly disrupted by Mitsotakis’ government.

The KKE has nothing to do with their political games, as demonstrated over the years by its militant opposition to all anti-people’s bourgeois governments, no matter how they call themselves. Furthermore, a wealth of experience has now been accumulated among the people, which shows that there can be no “just”, “progressive” or “democratic” management within the framework of the capitalist path of development.

That is why the KKE will not show tolerance towards a government that manages capitalist barbarism, whatever name it bears. No proposal of bourgeois management can negate the laws of capitalist economy and cure the crises of the “sick man” or provide a way out of the impasses of capitalism. Whatever works as a “remedy” in one phase, turns out to be “poison” in another.

The “fair green transition” and the “fair recovery fund” are a myth. The claims that the “state-owned Public Power Corporation (DEI)” can play a pro-people role in the context of a liberalized energy market are a myth. The “pro-peace NATO and US-NATO bases” are a myth. The “democratic institutional framework” for repression and phone-tapping is a myth.

The implementation of anti-people and anti-labour policies by the so-called democratic and progressive governments as well as the notion of the “lesser evil” have proved to be the best breeding ground for far-right and reactionary forces, as demonstrated by the recent election results in Italy and elsewhere.

4. In the even more difficult times ahead of us and the “harsh winter” due to high prices, destitution, and war, the organization of the workers’–people's counter-attack and the alignment with the KKE is our shield.

The people need to utilize the rich experience they have gained and turn their backs on “scenarios” and “negotiations” about bourgeois governments, which are formed by the well-known worn-out materials that have brought us to this point.

It turns out that the great problems of our time cannot be tackled with the same old formulas, with eyes fixed on the past, with the same failed choices —in the name of the “lesser evil”— that lead to new concessions and disappointment.

There are no “saviours” for the people. Whenever the people have pinned their hopes on “solutions” from above, on the alternation of the parties in government that leads to a dead end, and on scenarios painted by the ruling class, they were the losers. However, whenever the people have earned an achievement, it was because they believed in their own strength, organization, and struggle, with the KKE always at the forefront; because they wrote their own story for their own needs.

The people can write their own story and become the protagonists of the developments by struggling and strengthening the labour movement, the movements of the self-employed, scientists, farmers, the youth, and women from the popular strata. The people need to:

‣ Hinder the plans that call upon them to pay once again to bail the system out.

‣ Refuse to survive on state benefits that are supposedly provided to tackle the high prices e.g. of electricity, and vanish as soon as they are paid. This is money that comes from the workers through taxes and perpetuates the causes of soaring prices, ultimately subsidizing the profits of the business groups in the energy and other sectors.

‣ Demand substantial and effective relief measures, based on the proposals put forward by the KKE and the demands formulated by the class-oriented labour movement, the hundreds of trade unions, Labour Centres, and Federations.

The struggles waged during the recent period in a number of workplaces and sectors such as COSCO, “e-food”, LARCO, the building sector, the shipyards, and the Kavala Fertilizers, have shown what the workers can achieve if they turn their back on notions calling them to wait for governmental solutions; if they believe in their strength and rely on their own struggle.

Let’s think about what would happen if those examples were multiplied; if the flashpoints of resistance and struggle were multiplied; if the participation of the workers in trade unions and other mass organizations was increased; if the social alliance between the workers, the self-employed, and farmers was strengthened; if a large, robust, popular movement was formed, opening the way for a way out for the benefit of the people.

That is what the KKE fights for every day. That is why we need a very STRONG KKE everywhere; in the workplaces, the cities, the villages, the Parliament, the municipalities and regions all over Greece.

The KKE is the only party that has no involvement with capital, business groups, and imperialist unions. It is the only party that struggles so that our people hold their heads high and unwaveringly supports the workers’–people’s struggles.

That is why it does not retreat in the face of difficulties, restrictions, and repression; it never loses its orientation towards the organization of the workers’–people's struggle.

5. We address

‣ All those with whom we have struggled together in the workplaces and all those with whom we struggle together every day for the regroupment of the labour movement and the other mass movements; against the anti-popular laws of the government, intimidation by employers, and the undermining stance of the employer-led trade unionism.

‣ All those who question and oppose NATO and the EU, the military plans and sanctions that the people ultimately pay for. Joining forces with the KKE is the most consistent stance against those choices, about which the KKE consistently warns the people and organizes their resistance.

‣ The workers’–people’s forces that have no trust in the bourgeois parties and witness the decay oozing from every pore of the capitalist system. Those who, when asked which of the current or would-be rulers can provide a solution to the people’s problems in opinion polls, answer “no one”.

‣ The young people, who are living the best years of their lives in a constant “crisis”, formerly marked by the memoranda, then by the pandemic, and now by high prices, war, and insecurity about the future.

The totality of what we have been daily experiencing during all these past years highlights the undeniable fact that there can be no solution to the acute and ever-worsening popular problems within the limits of the capitalist system and this policy.

The KKE can lead the popular counter-attack because it has a programme that expresses the interests of the working people. This is proved every day by its forces, who struggle to hamper the anti-popular choices and alleviate the workers’ problems. It is the real opposition today that opens the path for a way out for the benefit of the people.

This includes exploiting every difficulty and crack in the bourgeois political system in order for the people to struggle under more favourable conditions. The people’s struggle that targets the real opponent, that is, the dictatorship of capital, can deepen those cracks even further and pave the way for a radical overthrow.

We do not walk this path alone.

Today, there are flashpoints of resistance and struggle all over the world that fill us up with hope and reveal the potential for a workers’–people’s awakening.

We can

‣ Open the way for the overthrow of capitalism, for radical changes in the society and the economy, for our people to become masters of their country and their labour, based on a strong KKE and a mass workers’–people’s counter-attack.

‣ Utilize all the modern capabilities of production, technology, and science to meet the workers’–people’s needs, with the precondition that energy, food, and basic goods are not produced as commodities under the control of large business groups but become social property; that scientific central planning is developed; that the workers and the people hold the reins of power.

The socialist organization of society is the contemporary and truly new in the 21^st century that can safeguard the interests of the workers and the people.

That is why joining forces with the KKE means contributing to the struggle for this prospect.

The people no longer have the strength to show tolerance for the present barbaric system and its various exponents.

We firmly believe and declare that

WE CAN write our own story and put an end to today’s barbarism! For HOPE to rise!

With the KKE for what is great, beautiful, and utterly amazing!

Socialism is the answer in the 21^st century.