Covid and rational capitalist governments.docx

From:   TOE/J.

To:        IS/NY, E. (London)

Athens, 18 April 2020

Covid and (non-exceptional) capitalist government

The Greek government has reacted to the Covid outbreak differently than other countries eg US, GB, Italy, Spain etch by taking measures very early on. The reason for that is not because it is an exceptional capitalist government who cares about the population but on the contrary because they know how weak is the health system of the country. Every country will act a bit different in a given crises but that does not change the role or the character of capitalism (eg more “humane”). There are some obvious differences among those countries: like the size of the country, the size and strength of each economy, the history of the country (eg see the number of dictatorships we had in the last 100 years in a country like Greece) as well as the component of class struggle.

Here the right-wing government of ND seeing also how the outbreak had developed in Italy took measures in advanced. Less than two weeks after the first COVID case in the country was confirmed they had closed all schools and had suspended all mass events. Few days after the initial measures, they also closed all nonessential shops and banned nonessential movement. By the time there was the first death from COVID almost all measures were already in place. Until today the number of deaths in Greece of COVID is as low as 108 people and the total number of infected (at least officially) is 2224 people.

In Greece ND knew how fragile and weak is the health system. It was them (as well as SYRIZA) that had shut down many hospitals and had banned the hiring of new doctors and nurses in an attempt EU dictates to lower the costs of public health. It is because of the economic crisis and austerity under the EU dictates that thousands of doctors left the country. If they had not acted as they did for COVID outbreak the political cost that they would have to face would be devastating for the party of ND but also it could create a more unstable situation for the Greek bourgeoisie.

That of course does not mean that they acted in the interest of the working class, on the contrary they acted in the interest of the bourgeoisie in short and long turn. In the measures the government took was also 11 million euros to the private tv channels in order to promote the works of the government and to under-report any problems from society and hospitals. They also gave 30 millions to private hospitals in order to be able to sub-rent intensive care units if and when needed and also to provide tests for Covid instead of allowing the public medical universities to provide the tests for all the population and most importantly free as they had proposed to the government that they can do.

National Unity and State Repression

Since the beginning of the new measures for Covid police is on the streets by dozens, stopping people, searching, giving fines for unessential movement. In order to get out of your house if your work your employer needs to provide you with a paper saying your home address and the work address and the exact time of your work schedule, if you do not work you need to either text the state or have a signed paper with you that says the reason you are on the streets (there are 6 reasons that allows you to leave your house). Police even gave tickets to homeless because they were “unnecessarily on the streets”. It is not only covid that makes people feel unsafe, it is also the police state measures with the repression and harassment that looks like a “general rehearsal” for times to come.

Few days ago, Prime Minister in a televized address to the nation commended Greeks for adhering to the restrictive measures implemented over the past five weeks to stem of the spread of the coronavirus in the country. He said the biggest gain from the “unprecedented crisis” will be the trust towards the state (!), the government (!!) and the fellow citizen. At another point he added that today we are building “a more powerful state”. [When I heard him talking about the trust to the state and to the government, and the creation of a more powerful state I felt a shudder!]

Some of what we hear every day from the government and read in the papers are: "Our collective destiny depends on our individual responsibility", "Individual responsibility will judge the outcome of this battle" etch. The state, by citing individual responsibility as a key factor in the outcome of the epidemic, is trying to silence state responsibility and the incapability of capitalism. The present crisis is not just a health crisis but a capitalist crisis. The bourgeoisie – under the EU dictates - has been underfunding and understaffing for so many years, has closed public hospitals, has left a country of 10 million residents with 565[1] ICU beds, fires health workers, now calls for a "national unity" to deal with the pandemic, a "common conscription of all Greeks", in order to deal with the "invisible enemy". As they say: in such circumstances we must "avoid" "polarization" and "confrontation". ND government, say "the COVID does not distinguish borders or nations, incomes or social groups. Against him, we are all equal”. In the same line Alexis Tsipras (leader of SYRIZA) wrote in a recent article: "What matters at this time is that we all fight together, united for life[...] now is the time of responsibility and not confrontation." Even if we accept that the first sentence of the prime minister was correct when he said that "the COVID does not distinguish borders or nations, incomes or social groups” but for sure the second sentence where he said “Against it, we are all equal” that is definitely NOT TRUE. If you have the means you also have faster and better medical attention, you have the money to ensure a ICU bed in a private hospital – because the public are not enough, you can pay 200 euros to do the test whenever you want, you do not have to wait in unending lines in order to tell you if you can have the test or not etch.

A couple days ago they found positive in COVID some ROMA who live in a camp in an area in middle of Greece. According to an article from a pro-SYRIZA bourgeois newspaper on the housing situation of the Roma in Greece in a survey on 2018 there are 104.210 Roma who live in 314 different areas in the country. From those more than 8.500 are living “in extreme conditions of impoverishment, with shacks instead of houses, with a complete shortage of basic goods such as water supply, electricity, sewerage system with rodents and accumulation of rubbish confirmed that the situation is out of control and there are serious risks to both the health of people living in the camps and public health in general.” While the biggest proportion almost 60.000 of Roma are living in mixed camps, where houses and shacks coexist. Roma have always been an easy target for state repression not only here but all over Europe and they are at the bottom of society.

The only reason that the immigrants have not be blamed at least not initially for “spreading the illness” is because the first COVID patients in Greece was a bunch of Greeks that had just returned from the “holy lands” of Jerusalem. But they are used (immigrants) in order to increase the anti-Turkish chauvinism in combination with the “national unity in times of need”. [At the same time Greek nationalism against Turkey is used in order to increase the anti-immigrants’ sentiment]. The last few days there are repeated news reports that Erdogan is planning to send to the Greek islands boats full of immigrants’ who are infected with COVID. As a bourgeois paper writes “Greek authorities have found out that numerous migrants in Turkey have been concentrating in the country's western seaside towns, as if ready to cross into neighboring Greece's islands in the Aegean Sea. More worrying, sources that cannot be named but are considered reliable believe that Turkey has a plan to push migrants infected with the coronavirus to cross into Greece and other parts of Europe in the midst of the virus pandemic.” Immigrants are trapped by thousands in camps under terrible conditions, with limited access if any at all to medical treatment, with very limited access to water and with no health measures what so ever.  

Of course, in all this “emergency situation” the parliament has been able to pass – or plans to pass in the next days - at least a dozen new laws under “emergency” procedures that have to do from changes in education to immigration policy, prison rights, working rights etch.

On April 7, on the occasion of  World Health Day, mobilizations took place all over Greece, in the gates and in the courtyards of hospitals. The mobilizations were initiated by the Federation of Doctors' Associations in Hospitals, demanding the immediate adoption of measures to substantially strengthen public health, to protect the people and the workers. In one of the mobilizations, which took place at the "Evangelismos" Hospital (Athens) the government sent strong police forces to the hospital's courtyard, seeking to disperse the rally, under the pretext of "banning rallies of more than 10 people". Eventually the police forces withdrew under the reaction of the workers (nurses and doctors who were shouting to them to get out). They didn’t want to provoke the public opinion by arresting or attacking to the doctors who up to that day were portraited by the government as the everyday “heroes”. In doing so (repressing them) the political cost would be too big.

Another thing that has happened the period of isolation is increase in domestic violence towards women and also children. At the same time and from day one when schools closed women had to either stop working or work from home in order to be able to take care of the children. Also, because the elderly is in more danger, they have to take care the parents and the grandparents. The burden of the Covid crisis under capitalism has hit them harder and the moto is “back to the family”.

A couple weeks ago there was a riot in woman’s prison asking for better conditions after the death of an imprisoned women who in the beginning though that she had died because of Covid. The reaction of the state was to send riot police and beat the hell out of them sending two Roma women to the hospital.

KKE

The Stalinist KKE although it has a lot of articles in defense of the working class (like working conditions, protection measures under the pandemic, mobilizations [very small because of the situation] etch), at the same time they demand from the government to “confiscate the private hospitals”. Even more grotesque they spread illusions to the capitalist system that it can be pressured to act in the interest of the working class and the oppressed. KKE writes “the government and the bosses are using the slogan ‘all together we will overcome the crisis’ and by that want us silenced which is nothing more than hypocrisy and bourgeoisie morality. Because we can’t all together do health recruitments, to confiscate the private sector, to take prevention and protection measures. This, under this system, must be done by the government and the state, together with the class that has the real power and ownership. And that's until the working class, the people ‘all together,’ united, to put them aside permanently and irrevocably and build a society where social goods will be the priority, as opposed to the capitalist profit that leads to the death of our fellow human beings.“ (our emphasis)

Interesting enough although they have the position that China is imperialist in an attempt to justify China’s different reaction on the pandemic they write “even the management of the pandemic in capitalist China reveals its socialist remnants and shows that socialism has left still three decades after its overturning a strong social footprint”

On EU although KKE blames them for all the evil on the world their demand is for “disengagement from the EU with the working class in power”. For whoever did not understand it mean that we must leave the EU when the working class will first have taken the power in an abstract future.

KKE in accordance to the terrible position it has on the state, they defend the police and even had a question on the parliament on what measures does the government takes in order to protect them in the pandemic so they can be able to do their jobs.

European Union

What we achieved with our fights before and during the Plenum has proven its validity under the Covid outbreak. Although the lessons of the Plenum have not yet been realized by all (tried to hide the Plenum in Spartacist) our position was valid on the illusions of the EU as a super-state with common borders and a “human” face. It is very important for all our sections to publish powerful propaganda against the EU and expose our opponents for their support to the EU.

EU has shown how unstable it is during the crisis of COVID: When Italy asked for help Germany denied. It was Cuba who sent them doctors and nurses to assist them. When Greece orders medical supplies from China they were stopped and confiscated in a German airport. After Spain and Italy asked for financial help it took three days of “discussions” in order for the main imperialist powers of EU (mainly Germany) to come up with a plan of new memorandums. According to the IMF unemployment for Greece will be 22.3% while the recession can be up to 13% (the recession during the economic crisis in 2012 was 7.3%). The new memorandum – that for sure will come - will lead to more attacks to the unions and the workers’ rights. In Greece with the huge petty-bourgeoisie (mainly small family owned shops) the outcome after Covid will be even more devastating. In the epoch after Covid we will probably face also the possibility that fascists and right-wing forces will grow. That can be true not only for Greece.

At the same time all through EU national antagonisms between states is increasing. Borders are shut down for people but not for workers exploitation (see what happened with Germany and Romanian land workers). Every bourgeoisie of Europe has been over occupied with concerns for its own country, its own health system, its own citizens [in the degree that they give a shit], its own supplies etch. Nationalism is increasing and that will also increase the anti-immigrant sentiments in Europe and elsewhere.

Church and State

Not surprisingly the only measure that was implemented not by direct governmental order but only after days of discussions and begging and only after an agreement, was the closing of the churches. As the church announced: “The Holy Synod, the ruling body of Greece’s Orthodox Church, agreed to suspend all daily services and sacraments for an indefinite period as part of the government’s efforts to contain the spread of the new coronavirus.” But even after the “agreement” we have seen many occasions that priests have open the churches to the believers especially this week which is the Greek orthodox Easter. Priests were insisting – and still are – that no harm can come to the believers that participate in the holy communion because “no disease can be carried through the blood and body of Crist”. Holy communion in Orthodox Church is given through one spoon and one cup to all those who participate (just to be clear: one and the same cup and spoon for all). Just yesterday police made 13 arrests outside a church were dozens of “believers” were gathered. Many people of those “believers” were members of Golden Dawn. In many more occasions that churches were “illegally” opened there were only recommendations from the government or the police showing once more the power that the church has upon the Greek state.

Additional information

In the country the measures have worked until now but that is because people stayed home and not because the government is doing something to protect the people. At the same time the participation of hundreds of voluntaries is just covering the gaps and are used in order not to do the necessarily hiring.

Even here in Greece with all its debt they tried to buy off the population. What they offered is 800 euros for every business is in lock-down (it is for a total of 750.000 employs) and a voucher of 600 euros in online education for those who are self-employed and have lost or reduced their income (like me [it is for a number of 85.000 self employs]) as well as 400 euros for 155.000 unemployed. Even that is not per month but it supposed to cover the losses for March and April.

A real fear remains for the time after the “corona virus period”: how many of the “necessary measures” will still remain. That’s the fear for thousands of workers that have been sent home during the crisis, who work from home or work with less hours and with less pay, who lost their jobs and so on.

Cg’s

J.