Split may spell disaster for French Left

Press, 11 May 1979, Page 6

Split may spell disaster for French Left

| NZPA-Reuter Paris The French Communist Party, which traditionally represents about one-fifth of the electorate, has widened its breach with its former Socialist allies and softened earlier harsh criticism of the Soviet Union.

The party secretary-gen-eral (Mr Georges Marchais), iin a four-hour speech to the I party’s national congress, accused the Socialist Party leader, Francois Mitterrand, of “masking their Rightwing politics with Left-wing or ultra-Left-wing talk.”

The combined SocialistCommunist Opposition failed to win the last General Election in March, 1978, a blow which virtually shattered their already tottering six-year-old alliance. While neither party has completely excluded a new Left-wing union to fight the Presidential election due in two years’ time, Mr Marchais’s harsh words at the opening session of the congress appeared to close the door on any rapprochement in the near future.

With the increasing Communist attacks on the socialists, most political observers i expect the Communist Party to turn inwards and fight Mr Mitterrand’s party as i vigorously as the Right. 1 This could prove dis-

I astrous for the Left in the 1981 Presidential elections. At the last poll in 1974, Mr Mitterrand, who then had Communist backing, lost to Valery Giscard d’Estaing by only 1.4 per cent. Unless the Communists and Socialists agree on a joint strategy in the 24 months before the next elections, a deep-rooted Leftwing split could assure the Centrist Mr Giscard D’Estaing of a return to power. At the same time, Mr Marchais, whose speech summarised the main resolutions before the five-day meeting, moderated the party’s criticism of the So-

viet Union and other Communist States. Mr Marchais said there had been no events in Communist countries which matched the atrocities committed under Right-wing rule in Chile, South Africa, Uruguay, South Korea, and Argentina. “But this obviously does not make us forget the crimes which plunged the history of socialism into gloom during the period of Stalin nor the grave and serious gaps in Socialist countries between reality and what socialist democracy could and should be here and now,” he said. The French party’s last congress in 1976 had condemned Stalinism, Mr Marchais said, and "ue reaffirm that it is our right and our duty to express publicly our disapproval of attacks on liberties, which clearly show that sequels of this (Soviet) past still exist.” But the French Communist chief’s reference to present-day events in the Soviet Union were less harsh and less specific than those he made three years ago. ( The party’s 1976 criticism of Moscow seemed at the time to be aimed at appeas ing the Socialists — a trend [which has now been partially reversed. ‘ j