'Internal Fraction' of the ICC

So the IFICC maintains its fiction: they are the Real ICC. They are the true heirs of MC, the militant of the Italian left who played a crucial role in the foundation of the ICC. (and in doing so, they also maintain their repulsive campaign of personalised attacks on our militants). 

To all the Parisian members of the group called the “Internal Fraction of the ICC”

We took note of your text published on your web site in which you support a "Declaration", dated October 2nd 2004, of a "Circulo de Comunistas Internacionalistas", which is presented in the form of a successor of the NCI of Argentina, to denounce the "ignominy" of "these bastards" (according to your own words) who direct the ICC. In this text, you denounce slanders of which you have been victims and that were used to justify your exclusion from our organisation...

In number 28 of the Bulletin of the so-called ‘Internal Fraction of the ICC’, published on its website, readers can discover the latest offerings of this parasitic grouplet: it has given its wholehearted support to the repugnant activities of an adventurer who presents himself under the name of the ‘Circulo de Comunistas Internacionalistas’ (see the articles published on our website and in World Revolution 280) . If we are now devoting an article to the IFICC Bulletin, it is because a group of the communist left, the International Bureau for the Revolutionary Party (IBRP) has given its approval to the methods of this shady band: it has justified the latter’s theft of our political material (see our article‘Lies and slander are no methods of the working class!). The article below has the aim of refuting some of the lies and slanders disseminated by the IFICC Bulletin...

Introduction (October, 2004)

At the time of its 15th international congress, in April 2003, the ICC excluded from its ranks several elements who had openly behaved like informers and who, under the name of "Internal Fraction of the ICC", had gathered around the individual Jonas (himself excluded from our organization for "behaviour unworthy of a communist militant", see A communique to our readers). With regards to the attitude of Jonas and the members of the "FICCI", which consistied of refusing to defend oneself in front of the Congress of the ICC, our organisation, in accordance with the tradition of the workers' movement, had applied a policy of the defence of proletarian principles: it had proposed to them to call upon a Jury of Honour (which they refused) composed representatives of other organizations of the Communist Left, in order to make clearn the nature of their behaviour and the causes of their exclusion.

Prior to its September public forum in Paris on anti-globalisation (see the article on page 8 of this issue, based on the presentation given at the meeting), the French section of the ICC called on other sections, as well as sympathisers of the ICC, to attend this meeting to express their solidarity with the section, which is one of the two most directly confronted with the presence of the parasitic group that calls itself the Internal Fraction of the ICC . As we explain in more detail in our article 'The ICC does not allow snitches into its public meetings', published on our website as a supplement to WR 267, the ICC, having excluded these elements from the organisation at our last international congress, took the decision to bar them from our public meetings as well. In our view, the activities of this group constitute a danger not only to the ICC but to the whole milieu of proletarian political organisations. In particular, its constant use of personal information and innuendo about members of the ICC on its website and in its bulletin puts it on the same level as that of informers and provocateurs. Closing the doors of our meetings to them is thus an elementary act of self-defence. This view is reinforced in the letters we print below. They come from three of our sympathisers in the UK, two of whom were able to attend the meeting in person, where they met members and sympathisers of the ICC from a number of countries.

At the end of March, the ICC held its 15th Congress. This was a particularly important meeting for our organisation, for two main reasons.

First, since the last Congress held in spring 2001, we have witnessed a major aggravation of the international situation, at the level of the economic crisis and above all at the level of imperialist tensions. More precisely, the Congress took place while war was raging in Iraq, and our organisation had the responsibility to make its analyses more precise in order to make the most appropriate intervention.

The parasitic group which calls itself the 'Internal Fraction of the ICC', formed around the individual Jonas who was expelled from the ICC for behaviour unworthy of a communist militant (see our communique in WR 252), is now openly revealing its true nature. The method of informers

The ICC has taken the decision to bar from its public forums and contact meetings members of the so-called ‘Internal Fraction’ of the ICC . This is the first time that our organisation has taken such a decision and it is necessary to explain publicly the reasons for it to the groups and elements of the proletarian political milieu and the working class in general.

We have already dealt in our press with the so-called "Internal Fraction of the ICC" (IFICC). This is a parasitic group which constituted itself within our organization; under the cover of fine phrases about its desire for "correcting and saving the ICC", its real function has been sabotaging its work and trying to destroy it. The International Extraordinary Conference of the ICC which was held at the end of March 2002 noted that the Parisian elements constituting this supposed "fraction" (which also has an offshoot in Mexico) were deliberately placing themselves outside our organization on a number of counts: their repeated violations of our statutes (in particular the refusal to pay their contributions fully) and their refusal to make a commitment to respect them in the future; their refusal to present their defence before the extraordinary conference; the theft of money and of material of the ICC (internal files of addresses and documents).

The alleged "intimidation" of a militant of the PCI

Believing what the "IFICC" says in connection with the "Stalinist methods of the ICC" (and having apparently forgotten the sentence of Lenin: "Whoever believes the word of another is an incorrigible idiot"), the PCI continues on this topic: "It is inevitable that the climate which is created in the ICC is reflected on the outside. Thus, one of our comrades who had had the misfortune to criticise such methods in a public meeting of this organisation (while reaffirming that he did not in any way defend the Fraction), saw himself consequently informed of the 'rupture of any political relations' with himself. The significance of this curious declaration appeared a few days later, when he was insulted and jostled during a sale by an ICC militant. We do not want to attach a disproportionate importance to this incident, which is perhaps due to the excitement of local militants. But it must be clear that we do not intend to let the limits of our criticism be dictated to by anyone, and by any measures of intimidation, including physical. 'Learn from what we say, it shall not be repeated!'".

In its number 463 (August-September 2002), the newspaper Le Proletaire, organ of the Parti Communiste International (PCI) published an article entitled: 'In connection with the crisis in the ICC' which deserves a certain number of corrections. Initially, the article affirms that one of the members of the so-called 'Internal Fraction' ('IFICC') which had been constituted in the ICC "is denounced ... as a probable 'agent provocateur'." Here is what we wrote in World Revolution 252 concerning the exclusion of Jonas (to which Le Proletaire refers implicitly):

In May the ICC began a series of forums on the theme of the defence of the revolutionary organisation. Despite the very serious events taking place on an international level (the US ‘war on terror’, the massive anti-fascist campaigns in Europe, etc), the ICC felt that it was necessary to keep to this theme because it has been subjected to a very grave attack, in the shape of a campaign of slander being waged by a few ex-members of the ICC grouped under the name of the ‘Internal Fraction of the ICC’ around the element Jonas, who has been expelled from our organisation for political unworthiness . Faced with such a situation it was the responsibility of the ICC to carry out the public defence of its principles of functioning. Without an organisation, there can be no intervention, and this is precisely the aim of the bourgeois state and its accomplices in the parasitic milieu: to destroy revolutionary organisations from the inside and discredit them in the eyes of the working class, and above all in front of those who have been looking for a class perspective in this moribund social system.

Since the following article was written the ICC has held an Extraordinary International Conference in which the organisation as a whole was able to discuss and take a position on the behaviour of the 'Fraction'. In next month's WR there will be an article on the work of this conference.

The ICC has just excluded one of its members. Such a measure is not often taken by our organisation. The last exclusion of a member of the ICC goes back to 1995 and the previous one took place in 1981. We only apply such a sanction when we are faced with extremely serious faults, and this is why we generally accompany it with a communiqu� in the press because we consider that the element being sanctioned represents a danger not just for our organisation but for the whole proletarian political milieu and the sympathisers of the communist left.

In its "Reply to the stupid accusations of an organisation in the process of disintegration", published (in French) on its Internet site, the IBRP has just made a new break-through in the serious opportunist deviation that we identified in our article "The IBRP taken hostage by thugs!". They are now justifying the anti-proletarian ways of a parasitic group, the self-proclaimed "Internal Fraction of the ICC".