Correspondents' Correspondence
MIHAJLOV, THOMAS O. MELIA / MIHAJLO
Correspondents' Correspondence BRIEF TAKEOUTS OF MORE THAN PERSONAL INTEREST FROM LETTERS AND OTHER COMMUNICATIONS RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS. Irony in Ethiopia Washington—The People's...
...Irony in Ethiopia Washington—The People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia is not a workers' paradise...
...Interestingly, the expression "block of Communists and non-Communists" was coined by Stalin...
...in Yugoslovia, as the Socialist Union of the Working People...
...There is little in this litany that is new —the nature of Ethiopia's postrevolutionary regime has been known for some time...
...From the start, however, the democratic unions and their Communist opposites found it impossible to agree on what a union was, let alone on how they might work together...
...Then Kurashvili gets to the heart of his idea: "Naturally, the new union will be subject to the general guidance of the Party, the vanguard of the people and the leading nucleus of all State and public organizations...
...Interbloc friction also arose over the structure of the Federation...
...Whether or not Gaspar's characterization of Mengjstu's Ethiopia was heartfelt, it was certainly original...
...The Western unions wanted to maintain it as an autonomous network of trade secretariats, each representing an international association of unions comprising particular types of workers—teachers, say, or public employees...
...The U.S...
...Ourworry is not only the problem of famine," the head of government's Relief and Rehabilitation Commission explained, "but the integrity of the country...
...and for the struggle waged and being waged to free Ethiopia from backwardness and oppression, and to build a new Ethiopia...
...in East Germany and Czechoslovakia, as the National Front...
...Amnesty International recently voiced concern about "reports of widespread torture and ill-treatment of political prisoners" in Ethiopia...
...Apparently the time has not yet arrived in the USSR for discussing, if only in theory, how to move from one-party rule to pluralism...
...At its founding in 1945, a sizable minority of the participants were independent trade unions that actually represented their dues-payers...
...The Soviet bloc unions insisted that those secretariats come under the control of the WFTU bureaucracy...
...On the matter of the "democracy for all workers" that Gaspar said Mengistu was encouraging, the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions—established by the democratic unions after they pulled out of the WFTU in 1949 —has this to say: "Government interference in trade union affairs occurs frequently and...
...Kurashvili laments the fact that no such entity exists in the Soviet Union, and blames this on the personality cult of the 1930s and '40s as well as the period of stagnation from the '50s to the early '80s...
...State Department's latest report to Congress on human rights around the world remarks that "Ethiopia has generated the largest number of refugees in Africa...
...Kurashvili is not, as some might infer, endorsing the creation of a body distinct from the Soviet Communist Party...
...This could have beennomore than the customary gesture of politeness toward a country hosting an international gathering...
...Individual rights are unprotected under conditions of despotism and anarchy...
...Since this year's WFTU meeting was being held in an African city, the focus naturally was on "strengthening solidarity with Africans, particularly with African workers, on the issuesof trade unions and the reduction of modern nuclear weapons"—according to a radio broadcast in Addis Ababa on March 29...
...the trade union movement is dominated by the political party in power...
...But reviving Stalin's notion of a "block of Communists and non-Communists" can only exacerbate the malaise perestroïka is supposed to dispel.—Mihajlo Mihajlov...
...He expressed great admiration and said he had confirmed these achievements personally...
...So one might be excused for thinking that when the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU) convened its 39th Annual Session in Addis Ababa at the end of March it was acting on the principle of "builders gotta go where buildings need building...
...There was a time when the WFTU ranks were more inclusive...
...Soon it became apparent that the Soviets were intent on using the WFTU mainly to oppose the Marshall Plan, notwithstanding widespread support for it in virtually all the European countries...
...and so forth...
...Before long all the democratic unions quit the Federation...
...As a member of the Politburo in Hungary and head of the Party-run national trade union organization, Gaspar is in a position to know a lot about how a bureaucracy can control the lives of working people...
...The government there, OPIC says, has failed to "adopt and implement laws that extend internationally recognized worker rights"—a statutory requirement for the program...
...But the following day it appeared that the WFTU president might be sincere in his esteem for the Ethiopian revolution: The radio reported that Gaspar awarded a gold medal to the nation's dictator, Lieutenant Colonel Mengistu Haile-Mariam, "in recognition of his decisive leadership, aimed at bringing about world peace and democracy for all workers...
...Soviet bloc unions, following Stalin's orders, signed on without exception...
...Although the American Federation of Labor never joined, the then separate Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) did, along with the British Trades Union Congress (TUQ, the Dutch, French and Scandinavian labor movements, and most of the others in the West...
...The WFTU claims to embrace 92 organizations from 81 countries and boasts a total membership of 214 million workers—two-thirds of whom are apparently accounted for by the USSR's "unions...
...Indeed, he goes on to make it abundantly clear that his "Democratic Union" would be totally controlled by the Party—as are the corresponding organizations in the neighboring Socialist countries...
...But that Sandor Gaspar and his colleagues could, in the midst of the terror and repression present "Comrade President Mengistu" with a gold medal for his "decisive leadership" in building "a new Ethiopia" says more about the World Federation of Trade Unions and its interest in working people than anything else that happened at the 39th Session.—Thomas O. Melia Communist Umbrella Washington—Over the last 18-24 months the USSR has seen an explosive growth in all kinds of unofficial associations, some of which are in fact embryonic political parties...
...The weekly Moscow News recently carried one entitled, "The Experience of Fraternal Countries...
...This month the authorities in Addis Ababa also announced that international famine-relief operations in the northern part of the country would have to be drastically curtailed because dissident communities were being fed...
...Political imprisonment, forced confession, execution, disappearance, and torture are common...
...Its headquarters was moved from Paris to Vienna, and eventually to Prague...
...He proposes remedying the situation now by setting up a mass organization that might be called the Democratic Union of Socialist Renovation, or perhaps the Popular Front in Support of Perestroika...
...The Federation's leadership, though, seemed to see things in a different light...
...It further noted "reports of summary executions of political prisoners and of people resisting resettlement into new villages...
...Despite a history of rocky relations with Communist unions in the interwar period, the Westerners felt an international labor body would be helpful in facilitating the reconstruction of Europe's war-torn economies...
...In January 1949, the three Western representatives in the WFTU Executive Bureau (from the CIO, the TUC and the Dutch national labor organization) finally walked out...
...Compare, for example, the assessment given by the current edition of Freedom in the World, an annual survey of global liberty published by Freedom House: "[Ethiopia] is ruled by a Marxist-Leninist military committee that has successively slaughtered the leaders of the ancien régime and many of its own leaders...
...A clue to their intentions can be found in the spate of articles on unofficial associations that have been appearing in the Soviet press...
...Today, the president of the WFTU is Sandor Gaspar...
...Secretary of State George C. Marshall...
...Moreover, the right to strike continues to be seriously restricted or entirely prohibited...
...In 1947 the Communists in the WFTU Executive Bureau tried to keep the American CIO representative from even describing the European Recovery Program being developed under U.S...
...agency set up to promote economic development in risky areas, will not provide loan guarantees or insurance for American firms to do business in Ethiopia...
...There are more than 1 million Ethiopian refugees living in neighboring countries, and tens of thousands, many of whom cannot return for fear of persecution, living abroad...
...Written by Boris Kurashvili, identified as a doctor of jurisprudence, it points to the example of neighboring Socialist states, where national organizations have long served as umbrellas for everything from the remnants of once-independent political parties to animal protection societies...
...In Bulgaria the umbrella group is known as the Fatherland Front...
...Furthermore, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIQ, a U.S...
...In fact, it will be the next step in the development and organizational streamlining of the long since proclaimed electoral block of Communists and non-Communists...
...In Ethiopia the trade unions are obliged by law to disseminate Marxist-Leninist theory and the development plans of the government among the workers, and to implement all decisions of the authorities, which is contrary to the right of trade unions to organize their activities and formulate their programs in full freedom...
...On March 30, the radio reported that in his address opening the 39th Session, "Comrade Sandor Gaspar said that the WFTU has followed with deep interest the significant achievements scored by the Ethiopian revolution since its inception...
...Faced with this phenomenon, the authorities seem to be casting about for ways of legalizing unsanctioned groups while at the same time keeping them safely under the Party's control...
...In Budapest he is considered a hard-liner, firmly opposed to the economic and political liberalization that has provided a model for the restructuring Soviet General Secretary Mikhail S. Gorbachev is trying to introduce elsewhere in the Communist world...
...The WFTU promotes workers' interests mainly by holding international conclaves and rallies devoted to peace and disarmament, and occasionally by calling for the repudiation of Third World debt to capitalist banks...
Vol. 71 • April 1988 • No. 7
