Unity of the communists and the experience of MLCP
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ADDITION

The place of "The Meeting of Evaluating the Opportunities for Unity" in our history

The shining sun of the beginning of the summer was fascinating. The sky was deep blue. Cool sea breeze was lightly blowing and the coming May Day was inviting to the fight. Under the peerless beauty of nature, they were meeting at a "nonsense" place as groups of two or three people. They were a bit more than the fingers of two hands in numbers. They had responsibilities and duties at middle or high level. Most of them were meeting for the first time and most of them were to participate in such a platform for the first time. On average they were middle aged. However, there were also younger and inexperienced ones. Their presence in that place was symbolizing a historical "moment" which definitely would be mentioned also in the future. They would either open a way to walk forward or this "work" would be postponed to a future time. (They spoke a lot, and they spoke little. They got angry; they got nervous. There were the ones with full excitement when speaking and the ones speaking too rarely. But a feeling of being comrades was bringing them closer. And it made them feel as comfortable as if they had been struggling together for forty years. They discussed for days and nights. They formed a collective mind. And they walked away with the clear conscious, which they had achieved.

***

Just one year ago, while they were struggling in the ranks of the TKIH or the TKP/ML Movement, the communists who are the members of the MLCP-F today were experiencing the tension of the struggle for unity which would determine all their future and of the coming Unity Congress. If we go back to the period of two years ago and look from the point of view of that period, we see that the situation was completely different. When we return to today and look at this process from this view, we see that the work for unity had come to the end of the long period of convalescence in which they had entered after being stagnant because of the crisis of trust and disagreement and despite the continuing regular relations, the developing work for unity and a collective line of struggle for unity hadn't been created yet. Though the biases and lack of trust had become tender, they hadn't been completely eliminated yet. The experiences of the unsuccessful first attempt and efforts for unity have not been understood deeply through being subjected to a materialist analysis and revolutionary criticism overcoming the pressure of the groupist preoccupations and the discouragement had not been cured. It was inevitable that different organisations had their own views about the developments to some extent as long as they existed; since their own histories and their present existences had conditioned this. However, despite all the difficulties, the TKP/ML Movement and the TKIH as the actors of the struggle for unity have succeeded to keep their desire for unity alive and to keep their revolutionary sincerity.
In the future of the MEOU (its future which has become "past" now), there stands the victory of the struggle for unity which was achieved through the general context of the MEOU's plan for unification and there stands MLCP-F. Therefore, the meeting was a platform of unity which has succeeded in its historical role. Undoubtedly, we could say that we have made history and to register it is the job of historians. However, we can look from a different point of view and we must. We have to learn from the history of the party and we have to advance our political education on the base of the history of the party. Unfortunately, as communists of Turkey and Kurdistan, we cannot say that we are successful at learning from our own history. We were neither able to create a strong tradition nor a rich accumulation of knowledge and experience in the past about using the critical revolutionary method of Marxism. Yet, we see that all the big and successful parties give a great importance to their own experiences and they give a considerable place and weight to their experiences for the development of their party and for the political education of their members. To learn from the communist and workers' movements of the other countries and to comprehend Marxism as a whole theory is a must of internationalism as well as of the universality of the theory. In this sense also, there is a necessity of implementing the critical revolutionary method of Marxism. We feel the need of emphasizing our responsibility to comprehend the basic events, the basic steps and the phases of our history, to take lessons from them and to utilise them as the irrefutable educational documents for the members.
Formation of all the events making a mark on history had been surrounded by numerous small problems, events and developments that encircles it similarly to the complexity of the rings one inside the other, that influences it in this or that way, that makes its formation easier or more difficult! What is important is to comprehend the needs of the historical development, to push the events in the direction of the historical development or to open its way by eliminating the events, problems and attitudes that form an obstruction before the historical development. In any case, the ones who are held up with the details and minor problems cannot choose the main link of the chain and loose the chance of being the subject of the historical development. And they even turn into a hindrance. We know that it is not easy to grasp the needs of the historical development and push the events in this direction. However the subjects of the historical development are effective as long as they grasp their roles and act in accordance with their roles in a conscious and deliberate manner. When it is about the party life and development, this forms the focus of each militant for evaluating him/herself.

***

Our action of unification as the fulfilling the most urgent and revolutionary duty of the day is a great success in the history of the communist movement which was written with the blood of the countless martyred comrades and with the unending revolutionary self-sacrifices but is mainly characterised by its defeats. Having achieved the impossible, we have deserved to call it our revolution.
It is great, because it has the power and character to affect all the later development process of the communist movement.
It is great, because, it is an intervention to the process of regression and fragmentation experienced by the communist movements all over the world for the last thirty years. It is an intervention both in terms of understanding and in practice, in action.
We have mentioned those at different times. Now there is the need to draw the attention especially to another point. Although it has not been comprehended clearly yet and our cadres of all levels yet have not shown the exact orientation that it requires, the greatness, value and importance of the success of our action of unification can be seen clearly looking at the composition of our cadres. The cadres of all levels are the special and main product of revolutionary struggle and communist work. If no development is possible without learning from history, the cadres are the living instruments that carry the experiences. The MLCP-F has gathered and combined the experiences of the TKP/ML Movement and the TKIH (and the TDKIH, therefore, the TDKP to some extend) in its body on the concrete reality of the composition of cadres. The three generations of cadres who were shaped at the periods of '71,'75-'80 and after '88 is another qualificational dimension of the mentioned accumulation that has to be emphasised. The base for us to walk from towards the future confidently and with big claims is, first of all the rich accumulation of knowledge and experience which is concretised in the structure of the cadres that we have achieved through the action of unification. To appreciate invaluable treasure in a way that it deserves, it is necessary to make the relationship style among the cadres more active, and to make clear our necessity for renewing ourselves by subjecting the revolutionary practice and the experience of the revolutionary and communist movement to revolutionary criticism. If we do not show a deliberate orientation, the qualificational development that we wanted to achieve and was possible with the MLCP-F will be at risk and the development in quantity will stand in the foreground. If we do not show a deliberate orientation, the qualificational development that we wanted to achieve and which was possible with the MLCP-F, we will be at risk and the development in quantity will stand in the foreground. The need for developing in quantity and the fact that the action of unification did have such an aspect as well is another dimension for understanding and is beyond debate. However, what we have to concentrate our attention on is, first of all, the fact that a leap forward in terms of the level and capacity of political leadership has been achieved.
All the importance of our act of unification can be summarized as doing the best and the most progressive thing that could be done immediately and directly to solve the vital problem of creating the vanguard party in order to respond to the most urgent necessity of the fight of the proletariat and the labouring masses in our country. If we leave out the distinctive and special case of the TKP/ML-YIO, since we had also addressed the TIKB and the TDKP, the responsibility of not succeeding more than this completely falls upon these two organisations.
Only if we take all of the above into consideration, we can grasp the importance of the Meeting of Evaluating the Opportunities for Unity, which was held in April 1993, as a milestone for the existence of the MLCP-F.
It sounds like the MEOU meeting has been forgotten in our ranks. The comrades who participated in the meeting now speak of it as if it was just a "nice memory" or an interesting (!) meeting which is not necessary to be emphasised, they have difficulty in remembering the exact date of it, etc. The MLCP-F is very young at the moment and tries to form its specific history and traditions. In any case, the party must have a strong memory. Above all, it mustn't let the historically important steps of its existence and the principal phases of its development be forgotten due to memory loss. If these are forgotten or disregarded, it would neither be possible to create continuity and accumulation nor to learn from history. This does not only distinguish the vital sources but also conditions the structural diseases.
As the comrades who participated had witnessed and as it was firmly established in the reality of the Unity Congress in a more advanced form, the Meeting of Evaluating the Opportunities for Unity is a summary of the two organisations that came face to face with taking determining decisions. This is so, a as meeting or a collaborative meeting. Questions, worries, biases, lack of trust, desire to understand and know each other, over-reactions and touchiness, optimistic or pessimistic attitudes, the revolutionary needs of the struggle and of the future, status quo and the pressure of the specific history of the organisations, difficulties in understanding each other and differences in formation and style, the warm comradely feelings and becoming closer in the latter process of the meeting, a tense sensitivity at the moments of decision etc. In all typical examples, a formal and hands-off-attitude at first and later, comradely warmness and becoming closer is the characteristics of this kind of meetings (even some of the problems remaining beyond solution). Another typical and noticeable aspect is that there was a pessimistic and tense mood while discussing the past of the struggle for unity, the process left behind, "the negative contribution" of the organisations to the process while there was an enthusiastic, positive and optimistic mood when discussing the problems of developing and achieving the struggle for unity. This case is important as it shows that the cadres are shouldering the weight of the specific historical existences of each one's organisation. It shows the need to "liberate" the cadres in order to be able to use the critical revolutionary method of Marxism; the dialectic materialism without permitting the development of a rough denial of the history. The MLCP-F's need, as the continuation of the TKIH and the TKP/ML Movement, to internalise the history of these two organisations was making this liberation even more important.
The fact that the meeting in 1993 has been accepted as "The Meeting of Evaluating the Opportunities for Unity" shows that it has performed its mission perfectly. The meeting was responsible for putting an end to a process and crossing the road by making a new start. The meeting was aware of its historical role and succeeded more than this. It achieved a higher level in terms of the understanding of unity, the policy of unity and the most important one, the method of the unification. Succeeding the hardest thing by overcoming the crisis of trust and opening the door to develop the efforts for the unity is the historical role of the MEOU in the struggle for unity. The meeting was aware of this and the comrades who participated in it knew why they were there.
The unity was also including a change. The change was not only taken as a problem of each organisation but also as a common problem; this was the understanding.
The common decision defining the collective effort and responsibility was made clear by formulating the method of forming the platforms.
The dual understanding of unity developed the formulation of unity of organisations and of the communists united in the organisations. It would still be the organisations who would decide upon the unity, while the differences -instead of being differences between the organisations- would be taken as the differences between the communists organised in these two organisations which both had the desire for uniting in one single organisation and the decisions upon the differences would be taken at the UC.
Those had made the MEOU reach the key to open the door. The Unity Congress was determined as the authority to solve the problem of "the past" which was obstructing the work for unity under the conditions of a crisis of trust.
"The capacity of uniting" is possibly the most needed thing in such a difficult process as the struggle for unity. The discussion at the MEOU about the party unity which was taken as a separate agenda itself besides other topics was especially important in this sense. The capacity of uniting was concretised in the search for a common solution of the problem which had caused the occlusion of the process. "Will" and "flexibility" were the names of the capacity for uniting which was strongly needed in the struggle for unity and the fashionable "magic" words at that period. The capacity of uniting -which we needed at every phase of the struggle for unity that concluded with a victory in the UC- is one of the hint points of the MLCP-F's policy making style.
The MEOU had clearly made firm the policy of unity by deciding upon a unification plan connected to the celebration of the UC. The work for unity achieved its goal by being fulfilled in the context of this plan.
When emphasizing the place of the MEOU in our history we should definitely draw attention to the following point which is the most interesting: the MEOU had the right to make decisions about its ideas. However, it had no authority in terms of law, no power of sanction and no binding force for the organisations. The decisions could have the possibility to be carried out only if they were accepted and adopted by the organisations and the leaderships of the organisations. The authority of the meeting was consisting of the convincing power of the decisions and the capacity of the comrades who accepted the decisions unanimously to influence and persuade their organisations and the leaderships. It can be accepted as a considerable paradox that the results of the MEOU were widely and generally considered as a "surprise" and had flared up the internal discussions of the organisations while on the other hand, they were accepted strongly. At the cost of having exaggerated it to some extend, we must emphasise that we owe the MLCP-F to the MEOU and that the MEOU was an expression of a leap forward in consciousness and will.
The comrade who spoke in the Unity Congress in the name of all the participants of the MEOU sincerely said: "In that period, I thought that the unity was a very difficult job to achieve, but soon I saw that it was even more difficult than I had thought". To achieve that difficult job in the MEOU was a magnificent example of communist will and it prepared us to overcome even bigger difficulties by raising the revolutionary will in a stronger manner.
To organise the education of all the members and the sympathisers of the party on the basis of these valuable pages of our history, which has been written on the memory of our dear MLCP-F with a steel pen, is the concrete task in our work for construction. Organizing meetings in all regions for our members, sympathisers and supporters and using the experiences of unification as a material of political education on the 3rd anniversary of the MEOU will energize our work for construction and will contribute to the formation of the MLCP-F members. The report that was presented to the Unity Congress by the Organisational Committee of the Unity Congress (KBEK) should be assessed as the basic resource in the mentioned work.

 

 

Footnotes and References

1-The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon, Karl Marx 1852
2- "Flag of Labour" Newspaper, "Joint Statement of TKIH, TKP/ML Movement and TDKP in Relation to the Unity of Communists", No.20, 11 November 1989.
3- A group, which was separated from TDKP in 1987, united with liquidator elements split from TKIH and TKP/ML Movement. The group, naming themselves "Ekim" (October), is the matured version of liquidator tendency for unity that was seeded by the defeat of 12 September. Refusal of the theoretical, programmatic and particularly the political and organisational achievements of the communist movement is their characteristics.
4- Flag of Labour Newspaper, No.20.
5- The Coordination Committee for Communist Unity was set up at the end of 1989 by TKIH and TKP/ML Movement. TDKP and TIKB were invited to all KBEK meetings. It was dissolved at the beginning of 1992 because of the failure of the unity work.
6- Documents of the Unity Congress, Evaluation of Unity Process and Lessons for Communists, p.200, BKOK Report.
7- Ibid.
8- "Communist Unity" was an organ of discussion published by KBEK and distributed among the cadres of organisations which were involved in the unity work. It was published in four issues.
9- TKIH Conference and Congress Documents, p.177.
10- Unity Will, Issue 1, Delegations' Statement on the Unification Plan declared by MEOU, under the heading of "To the Central Committees and Organisations of TKIH and TKP/ML Movement.
11- Unity Will, No 1, p.7.
12- Unity Will, No 3, p.5, Commission Report, dated 13 August 1993, under the heading of "To know how to learn and to strengthen the will of unity".
13- Unity Will, No 1, p.9, MEOU Unity Plan.
14- Unity Will, No 3, p.5, Commission Report dated 13 August 1993.
15- Unity Will, No 4, BKOK Statement dated October 1993.
16- Ibid.
17- Unity Will was an organ of discussion published by BKOK and distributed among the cades and organised sympathisers of organisations which were involved in the unity work. It was published in 24 issues in 1993-1994.
18- Unity Will, No 4, p.3.
19- Unity Will, No 4, p.4.
20- Unity Will, No 13, BKOK Report, dated April 1994, "The direction and tempo of the unity work".
21- Ibid.
22- Unity Will, No 1.
23- Documents of the Unity Congress, p.202.
24- Documents of the Unity Congress, p.233, "The announcement and call of the TKIH and TKP/ML Movement Unity Congress.
25- Ibid.
26- Ibid.
27- Ibid.
28- Barricade Days, p.182, Statement of MLCP-F Central Committee, dated 15 March 1995.
29- Barricade Days, p.185, Statement signed by MLCP-F on 19 March 1995.
30- Statement to the Party by the 3rd General Meeting of the Central Committee.
31- Ibid.
32- Decisions and Evaluations of the Party and Unity Conference, p.9.
33- Documents of the Unity Congress, p.207.
34- The Atilim Newspaper, 3 June 1995, No 34, Declaration of the 3rd Conference of TKP/ML-YIO.
35- Ibid.
36- Decisions and Evaluations of the Party and Unity Conference, p.6.
37- Ibid.
38- Ibid.
39- Party's Voice, No 3, April, 1995
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Unity of the communists and the experience of MLCP
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Page 5 / 5


ADDITION

The place of "The Meeting of Evaluating the Opportunities for Unity" in our history

The shining sun of the beginning of the summer was fascinating. The sky was deep blue. Cool sea breeze was lightly blowing and the coming May Day was inviting to the fight. Under the peerless beauty of nature, they were meeting at a "nonsense" place as groups of two or three people. They were a bit more than the fingers of two hands in numbers. They had responsibilities and duties at middle or high level. Most of them were meeting for the first time and most of them were to participate in such a platform for the first time. On average they were middle aged. However, there were also younger and inexperienced ones. Their presence in that place was symbolizing a historical "moment" which definitely would be mentioned also in the future. They would either open a way to walk forward or this "work" would be postponed to a future time. (They spoke a lot, and they spoke little. They got angry; they got nervous. There were the ones with full excitement when speaking and the ones speaking too rarely. But a feeling of being comrades was bringing them closer. And it made them feel as comfortable as if they had been struggling together for forty years. They discussed for days and nights. They formed a collective mind. And they walked away with the clear conscious, which they had achieved.

***

Just one year ago, while they were struggling in the ranks of the TKIH or the TKP/ML Movement, the communists who are the members of the MLCP-F today were experiencing the tension of the struggle for unity which would determine all their future and of the coming Unity Congress. If we go back to the period of two years ago and look from the point of view of that period, we see that the situation was completely different. When we return to today and look at this process from this view, we see that the work for unity had come to the end of the long period of convalescence in which they had entered after being stagnant because of the crisis of trust and disagreement and despite the continuing regular relations, the developing work for unity and a collective line of struggle for unity hadn't been created yet. Though the biases and lack of trust had become tender, they hadn't been completely eliminated yet. The experiences of the unsuccessful first attempt and efforts for unity have not been understood deeply through being subjected to a materialist analysis and revolutionary criticism overcoming the pressure of the groupist preoccupations and the discouragement had not been cured. It was inevitable that different organisations had their own views about the developments to some extent as long as they existed; since their own histories and their present existences had conditioned this. However, despite all the difficulties, the TKP/ML Movement and the TKIH as the actors of the struggle for unity have succeeded to keep their desire for unity alive and to keep their revolutionary sincerity.
In the future of the MEOU (its future which has become "past" now), there stands the victory of the struggle for unity which was achieved through the general context of the MEOU's plan for unification and there stands MLCP-F. Therefore, the meeting was a platform of unity which has succeeded in its historical role. Undoubtedly, we could say that we have made history and to register it is the job of historians. However, we can look from a different point of view and we must. We have to learn from the history of the party and we have to advance our political education on the base of the history of the party. Unfortunately, as communists of Turkey and Kurdistan, we cannot say that we are successful at learning from our own history. We were neither able to create a strong tradition nor a rich accumulation of knowledge and experience in the past about using the critical revolutionary method of Marxism. Yet, we see that all the big and successful parties give a great importance to their own experiences and they give a considerable place and weight to their experiences for the development of their party and for the political education of their members. To learn from the communist and workers' movements of the other countries and to comprehend Marxism as a whole theory is a must of internationalism as well as of the universality of the theory. In this sense also, there is a necessity of implementing the critical revolutionary method of Marxism. We feel the need of emphasizing our responsibility to comprehend the basic events, the basic steps and the phases of our history, to take lessons from them and to utilise them as the irrefutable educational documents for the members.
Formation of all the events making a mark on history had been surrounded by numerous small problems, events and developments that encircles it similarly to the complexity of the rings one inside the other, that influences it in this or that way, that makes its formation easier or more difficult! What is important is to comprehend the needs of the historical development, to push the events in the direction of the historical development or to open its way by eliminating the events, problems and attitudes that form an obstruction before the historical development. In any case, the ones who are held up with the details and minor problems cannot choose the main link of the chain and loose the chance of being the subject of the historical development. And they even turn into a hindrance. We know that it is not easy to grasp the needs of the historical development and push the events in this direction. However the subjects of the historical development are effective as long as they grasp their roles and act in accordance with their roles in a conscious and deliberate manner. When it is about the party life and development, this forms the focus of each militant for evaluating him/herself.

***

Our action of unification as the fulfilling the most urgent and revolutionary duty of the day is a great success in the history of the communist movement which was written with the blood of the countless martyred comrades and with the unending revolutionary self-sacrifices but is mainly characterised by its defeats. Having achieved the impossible, we have deserved to call it our revolution.
It is great, because it has the power and character to affect all the later development process of the communist movement.
It is great, because, it is an intervention to the process of regression and fragmentation experienced by the communist movements all over the world for the last thirty years. It is an intervention both in terms of understanding and in practice, in action.
We have mentioned those at different times. Now there is the need to draw the attention especially to another point. Although it has not been comprehended clearly yet and our cadres of all levels yet have not shown the exact orientation that it requires, the greatness, value and importance of the success of our action of unification can be seen clearly looking at the composition of our cadres. The cadres of all levels are the special and main product of revolutionary struggle and communist work. If no development is possible without learning from history, the cadres are the living instruments that carry the experiences. The MLCP-F has gathered and combined the experiences of the TKP/ML Movement and the TKIH (and the TDKIH, therefore, the TDKP to some extend) in its body on the concrete reality of the composition of cadres. The three generations of cadres who were shaped at the periods of '71,'75-'80 and after '88 is another qualificational dimension of the mentioned accumulation that has to be emphasised. The base for us to walk from towards the future confidently and with big claims is, first of all the rich accumulation of knowledge and experience which is concretised in the structure of the cadres that we have achieved through the action of unification. To appreciate invaluable treasure in a way that it deserves, it is necessary to make the relationship style among the cadres more active, and to make clear our necessity for renewing ourselves by subjecting the revolutionary practice and the experience of the revolutionary and communist movement to revolutionary criticism. If we do not show a deliberate orientation, the qualificational development that we wanted to achieve and was possible with the MLCP-F will be at risk and the development in quantity will stand in the foreground. If we do not show a deliberate orientation, the qualificational development that we wanted to achieve and which was possible with the MLCP-F, we will be at risk and the development in quantity will stand in the foreground. The need for developing in quantity and the fact that the action of unification did have such an aspect as well is another dimension for understanding and is beyond debate. However, what we have to concentrate our attention on is, first of all, the fact that a leap forward in terms of the level and capacity of political leadership has been achieved.
All the importance of our act of unification can be summarized as doing the best and the most progressive thing that could be done immediately and directly to solve the vital problem of creating the vanguard party in order to respond to the most urgent necessity of the fight of the proletariat and the labouring masses in our country. If we leave out the distinctive and special case of the TKP/ML-YIO, since we had also addressed the TIKB and the TDKP, the responsibility of not succeeding more than this completely falls upon these two organisations.
Only if we take all of the above into consideration, we can grasp the importance of the Meeting of Evaluating the Opportunities for Unity, which was held in April 1993, as a milestone for the existence of the MLCP-F.
It sounds like the MEOU meeting has been forgotten in our ranks. The comrades who participated in the meeting now speak of it as if it was just a "nice memory" or an interesting (!) meeting which is not necessary to be emphasised, they have difficulty in remembering the exact date of it, etc. The MLCP-F is very young at the moment and tries to form its specific history and traditions. In any case, the party must have a strong memory. Above all, it mustn't let the historically important steps of its existence and the principal phases of its development be forgotten due to memory loss. If these are forgotten or disregarded, it would neither be possible to create continuity and accumulation nor to learn from history. This does not only distinguish the vital sources but also conditions the structural diseases.
As the comrades who participated had witnessed and as it was firmly established in the reality of the Unity Congress in a more advanced form, the Meeting of Evaluating the Opportunities for Unity is a summary of the two organisations that came face to face with taking determining decisions. This is so, a as meeting or a collaborative meeting. Questions, worries, biases, lack of trust, desire to understand and know each other, over-reactions and touchiness, optimistic or pessimistic attitudes, the revolutionary needs of the struggle and of the future, status quo and the pressure of the specific history of the organisations, difficulties in understanding each other and differences in formation and style, the warm comradely feelings and becoming closer in the latter process of the meeting, a tense sensitivity at the moments of decision etc. In all typical examples, a formal and hands-off-attitude at first and later, comradely warmness and becoming closer is the characteristics of this kind of meetings (even some of the problems remaining beyond solution). Another typical and noticeable aspect is that there was a pessimistic and tense mood while discussing the past of the struggle for unity, the process left behind, "the negative contribution" of the organisations to the process while there was an enthusiastic, positive and optimistic mood when discussing the problems of developing and achieving the struggle for unity. This case is important as it shows that the cadres are shouldering the weight of the specific historical existences of each one's organisation. It shows the need to "liberate" the cadres in order to be able to use the critical revolutionary method of Marxism; the dialectic materialism without permitting the development of a rough denial of the history. The MLCP-F's need, as the continuation of the TKIH and the TKP/ML Movement, to internalise the history of these two organisations was making this liberation even more important.
The fact that the meeting in 1993 has been accepted as "The Meeting of Evaluating the Opportunities for Unity" shows that it has performed its mission perfectly. The meeting was responsible for putting an end to a process and crossing the road by making a new start. The meeting was aware of its historical role and succeeded more than this. It achieved a higher level in terms of the understanding of unity, the policy of unity and the most important one, the method of the unification. Succeeding the hardest thing by overcoming the crisis of trust and opening the door to develop the efforts for the unity is the historical role of the MEOU in the struggle for unity. The meeting was aware of this and the comrades who participated in it knew why they were there.
The unity was also including a change. The change was not only taken as a problem of each organisation but also as a common problem; this was the understanding.
The common decision defining the collective effort and responsibility was made clear by formulating the method of forming the platforms.
The dual understanding of unity developed the formulation of unity of organisations and of the communists united in the organisations. It would still be the organisations who would decide upon the unity, while the differences -instead of being differences between the organisations- would be taken as the differences between the communists organised in these two organisations which both had the desire for uniting in one single organisation and the decisions upon the differences would be taken at the UC.
Those had made the MEOU reach the key to open the door. The Unity Congress was determined as the authority to solve the problem of "the past" which was obstructing the work for unity under the conditions of a crisis of trust.
"The capacity of uniting" is possibly the most needed thing in such a difficult process as the struggle for unity. The discussion at the MEOU about the party unity which was taken as a separate agenda itself besides other topics was especially important in this sense. The capacity of uniting was concretised in the search for a common solution of the problem which had caused the occlusion of the process. "Will" and "flexibility" were the names of the capacity for uniting which was strongly needed in the struggle for unity and the fashionable "magic" words at that period. The capacity of uniting -which we needed at every phase of the struggle for unity that concluded with a victory in the UC- is one of the hint points of the MLCP-F's policy making style.
The MEOU had clearly made firm the policy of unity by deciding upon a unification plan connected to the celebration of the UC. The work for unity achieved its goal by being fulfilled in the context of this plan.
When emphasizing the place of the MEOU in our history we should definitely draw attention to the following point which is the most interesting: the MEOU had the right to make decisions about its ideas. However, it had no authority in terms of law, no power of sanction and no binding force for the organisations. The decisions could have the possibility to be carried out only if they were accepted and adopted by the organisations and the leaderships of the organisations. The authority of the meeting was consisting of the convincing power of the decisions and the capacity of the comrades who accepted the decisions unanimously to influence and persuade their organisations and the leaderships. It can be accepted as a considerable paradox that the results of the MEOU were widely and generally considered as a "surprise" and had flared up the internal discussions of the organisations while on the other hand, they were accepted strongly. At the cost of having exaggerated it to some extend, we must emphasise that we owe the MLCP-F to the MEOU and that the MEOU was an expression of a leap forward in consciousness and will.
The comrade who spoke in the Unity Congress in the name of all the participants of the MEOU sincerely said: "In that period, I thought that the unity was a very difficult job to achieve, but soon I saw that it was even more difficult than I had thought". To achieve that difficult job in the MEOU was a magnificent example of communist will and it prepared us to overcome even bigger difficulties by raising the revolutionary will in a stronger manner.
To organise the education of all the members and the sympathisers of the party on the basis of these valuable pages of our history, which has been written on the memory of our dear MLCP-F with a steel pen, is the concrete task in our work for construction. Organizing meetings in all regions for our members, sympathisers and supporters and using the experiences of unification as a material of political education on the 3rd anniversary of the MEOU will energize our work for construction and will contribute to the formation of the MLCP-F members. The report that was presented to the Unity Congress by the Organisational Committee of the Unity Congress (KBEK) should be assessed as the basic resource in the mentioned work.

 

 

Footnotes and References

1-The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon, Karl Marx 1852
2- "Flag of Labour" Newspaper, "Joint Statement of TKIH, TKP/ML Movement and TDKP in Relation to the Unity of Communists", No.20, 11 November 1989.
3- A group, which was separated from TDKP in 1987, united with liquidator elements split from TKIH and TKP/ML Movement. The group, naming themselves "Ekim" (October), is the matured version of liquidator tendency for unity that was seeded by the defeat of 12 September. Refusal of the theoretical, programmatic and particularly the political and organisational achievements of the communist movement is their characteristics.
4- Flag of Labour Newspaper, No.20.
5- The Coordination Committee for Communist Unity was set up at the end of 1989 by TKIH and TKP/ML Movement. TDKP and TIKB were invited to all KBEK meetings. It was dissolved at the beginning of 1992 because of the failure of the unity work.
6- Documents of the Unity Congress, Evaluation of Unity Process and Lessons for Communists, p.200, BKOK Report.
7- Ibid.
8- "Communist Unity" was an organ of discussion published by KBEK and distributed among the cadres of organisations which were involved in the unity work. It was published in four issues.
9- TKIH Conference and Congress Documents, p.177.
10- Unity Will, Issue 1, Delegations' Statement on the Unification Plan declared by MEOU, under the heading of "To the Central Committees and Organisations of TKIH and TKP/ML Movement.
11- Unity Will, No 1, p.7.
12- Unity Will, No 3, p.5, Commission Report, dated 13 August 1993, under the heading of "To know how to learn and to strengthen the will of unity".
13- Unity Will, No 1, p.9, MEOU Unity Plan.
14- Unity Will, No 3, p.5, Commission Report dated 13 August 1993.
15- Unity Will, No 4, BKOK Statement dated October 1993.
16- Ibid.
17- Unity Will was an organ of discussion published by BKOK and distributed among the cades and organised sympathisers of organisations which were involved in the unity work. It was published in 24 issues in 1993-1994.
18- Unity Will, No 4, p.3.
19- Unity Will, No 4, p.4.
20- Unity Will, No 13, BKOK Report, dated April 1994, "The direction and tempo of the unity work".
21- Ibid.
22- Unity Will, No 1.
23- Documents of the Unity Congress, p.202.
24- Documents of the Unity Congress, p.233, "The announcement and call of the TKIH and TKP/ML Movement Unity Congress.
25- Ibid.
26- Ibid.
27- Ibid.
28- Barricade Days, p.182, Statement of MLCP-F Central Committee, dated 15 March 1995.
29- Barricade Days, p.185, Statement signed by MLCP-F on 19 March 1995.
30- Statement to the Party by the 3rd General Meeting of the Central Committee.
31- Ibid.
32- Decisions and Evaluations of the Party and Unity Conference, p.9.
33- Documents of the Unity Congress, p.207.
34- The Atilim Newspaper, 3 June 1995, No 34, Declaration of the 3rd Conference of TKP/ML-YIO.
35- Ibid.
36- Decisions and Evaluations of the Party and Unity Conference, p.6.
37- Ibid.
38- Ibid.
39- Party's Voice, No 3, April, 1995
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