The more things change……
Initial reflections on a congress
In the early 2020s, the leadership of the CPI pushed back the boundaries of what could be done and thereby began to prophesy and normalise what might become possible. Indeed, more than four years and two national congresses later the party still stands firmly with the blunders and misjudgement from that period. The party has neither condemned nor condoned those actions, instead maintains a discipline of absolute silence.
Failing to repudiate the transgressions of the past is not a neutral stance by the newly elected NEC and officers: it is an open act of complicity with, and endorsement of, secret complaints, secret trials, institutional subterfuge, irregular expulsions, denial of appeals, denial of any due process, deliberate abuse of the party constitution, targeted intimidation and bullying…. in other words, political corruption and thuggery.
But there is a catch. The discipline of silence is also a trap – a self-imposed trap from which the CPI has been unable to escape and from which it never can escape unless it repudiates or justifies those actions.
While that may sound like the CPI has an option of either of those actions, in fact, it only has one choice: it has to repudiate its actions as the trail of written evidence precludes it from being able to justify any of the blunders/miscalculations/deliberate infringements. The written evidence is entirely self-incriminating, comprehensive and damning. Hence, the absolute silence in response to ANY accusation we have made against the party, its committees, its leadership and against named individuals.
Of course, its continuing reliance on the sound of silence is infinitely sustainable – if the CPI has no ambition to be anything more than an oddity that just exists, that is, a cult that exists purely for the gratification of its members. Cults do not have to pay much attention to the outside world and for the most part, do not subject themselves to any degree of scrutiny. Political parties, however, have no future in such an environment – at least, not serious political parties or organisations.
That brings us to a crucial issue: the matter of the rule of law. The only aspect of this concept that concerns us at this point is the party constitution and various standing orders of the party and of its various constituent parts. Either they have meaning or they don’t. Either they have application or they don’t. Either they have legitimacy or they don’t. Either they are observed or they are not.
Practically and effectively, these rules (should) ensure that the party is governed by established rules rather than the arbitrary decisions of the leadership. These rules (should) ensure that a member has a good idea how various situations will be handled and that the member can rely on reasonable and defined degrees of participation, respect, fairness, accountability, equality, justice and where necessary access to independent adjudication.
The question is not whether adherence to these rules is realistic. The question is whether the alternative is sustainable. We have seen what happened when a reckless and feckless leadership abandoned and prostituted the rules to satisfy immediate desires and settle old scores.
It brought calamity and ignominy on the party, its leadership and its members. The silence of the CPI when faced with the most serious charges of political thuggery and corruption is testament to this assertion.
The defining trait of today’s CPI is not unity or strength – it is the complete absence of a vision for the future and accountability for the past. The decision to continue to strangle the party with its disreputable past leads to the inescapable conclusion that the CPI is an incurable anti-communist entity. We will expand on this conclusion in coming posts.