Dear comrades, guests, representatives of national youth structures and organisations, international delegations here present from various parts of the world, to all of you, on behalf of the Portuguese Communist Party, I extend a warm greeting.
I extend a special greeting to all comrades of the Portuguese Communist Youth, to all those who, in various services, ensure the smooth running of the Congress, to the delegates, to the guests, to those who are here, to those who could not come, to the newly elected National Leadership, and to each of the collectives.
Greetings and my sincere congratulations on the success of your Congress.
If I may add a personal note, for me, the JCP Congress is a moment of particular significance. I had the privilege of being a member and leader of the JCP, a time that was decisive for my political, ideological and personal development. Together with many other comrades, many of whom are here today, I made my contribution, just as each one of you now, through your actions, however small they may seem, is an essential part of the struggle.
Here is the Portuguese Communist Youth, connected to the life and voice of youth, and so it has been over these two days. What a great Congress, what great strength, determination and confidence, and so it will be, I am sure, tomorrow in each and every one of the struggles.
Here was the life of the youth, their way of being, their concerns, problems and difficulties, but also their strength, characteristics, joy, creativity, dedication, militancy and hope.
Here were the dreams, the struggles, the realities expressed in the dozens of speeches made over these two days.
Here was the life of the youth as it is for the vast majority.
Here are an action and a struggle that are being waged based on today's concrete conditions.
Live to transform life, be builders of a new society, embrace your ideal, the communist ideal that guides the actions of millions of human beings and inspires the struggle of young people around the world.
The most beautiful, the most fraternal, the most humane ideal that humanity has ever known. This ideal is alive and more relevant than ever.
And so it is, even when the entire battery of capitalist disinformation affirms and reaffirms that we are facing a dead and finished theory. We understand well why there is so much investment, so many lies, and so many attacks.
Capitalism is well aware of its own contradictions and resorts to everything to delay its inevitable decline and end. Capitalism is exploitation, predation, injustice and inequality. It is not and never will be green.
What kind of system is this that makes war a business and pushes young people to their deaths to guarantee profits for the arms industry, that puts Humanity under serious threat, that pressures, blackmails, oppresses, sanctions and blockades sovereign peoples and states?
What kind of system is this that promotes racism, hatred, discrimination and fascism?
What kind of system is this that not only fails to solve hunger, poverty and the exodus of entire populations, but actually encourages them, condemning millions to a lack of access to healthcare and death from curable diseases?
What kind of system is this that wants to control natural resources for profit, even if millions of human beings lack drinking water?
Such a system cannot be the future of youth, and its revolutionary overthrow is the great goal and necessity of workers, peoples and youth.
And if it is true that every day the dangers are increasing, particularly through NATO, the EU, the US, the Trump administration and its deeply reactionary agenda of confrontation, interference and aggression aimed at imposing US imperialist domination on a global scale, it is no less true that every day hope is affirmed and the potential for progressive advances and even revolutionary developments opens up. These processes were expressed in this Congress.
Here was the heroic struggle of resistance by the youth and people of Palestine, that Palestine that will win, and that will be a victory for the youth and its people.
Here were the youth and people of Cuba, heroes who have been subjected to the criminal blockade of the United States and its lackeys for more than six decades, here was solidarity with the Saharawi youth and people in their struggle for the right to their homeland, here was solidarity with the youth and people of Venezuela, who face new provocations and direct threats from imperialism, here was the struggle to end wars and militarism, here was expressed the strength and courage of all those throughout the world who do not give up in the face of imperialism.
To all of them, to all their organisations, to the World Federation of Democratic Youth, we reaffirm: you can count on the Portuguese Communist Party and the Portuguese Communist Youth in their unwavering intervention of internationalist solidarity, you can count on our struggle in Portugal, the main and foremost contribution to the struggle of all.
A struggle that we are waging here today in a more demanding way in the face of a policy that is markedly at the service of economic groups, and which has as its instrument of choice a PSD/CDS Government and its proxies from Chega and the Liberal Initiative.
A policy that has the connivance of the PS, as was evident with the adoption of a State Budget, a piece of a disastrous policy that young people feel keenly.
Students feel that public schools and the right to free education are under attack, in the name of yet another business deal for capital.
There is a shortage of teachers, a lack of investment in primary and secondary schools, a lack of social action, a lack of housing, and in the face of all that is lacking, the priority is to increase tuition fees. They say it's only 13 euros. But if it's so little, if it makes no difference, then why the increase?
None of this has to do with the amount; it could even be one euro more, the battle is not just about the amount; the question is whether or not the Government and capital will be able to open the door to an increase in tuition fees, which today is 13 euros and tomorrow will be whatever it is.
And in light of this objective, here is the students' just response. Come rain or shine, and how it rained on October 28. But as I had the opportunity to say to the students on that same day, if the rain does not wash away the tuition fees, it will not wash away the students' struggle, their determination and courage either.
Primary, secondary and vocational students also have plenty of reasons for their struggle. I would even say that they have even more reasons given the attempts to limit their participation.
Attempting to limit student organisation, particularly student associations and their meetings, is to limit the political and civic education and organised participation of thousands of young people. What is at stake is not only student organisation, the RGAs, each struggle in each school around a specific problem is now also a struggle for the affirmation of participation, freedom and democracy.
For this policy, everything is about accumulating profits for big capital. This is the case in healthcare, with the ongoing dismantling of the National Health Service and the increasing transfer of public resources to the business of disease.
Only the NHS is in a position to guarantee access to healthcare for young people too. For example, what kind of country will we be if mental healthcare is handed over to business, how many thousands of young people will be left without the necessary care and what consequences will this have in the present and in the future?
And what about housing? Beyond the propaganda, the measures adopted serve speculation, they serve the 14 million euros in profits that banks pocket every day, they serve real estate funds and so-called non-habitual residents.
The Government has extended access to credit to young people and, in practice, has created conditions for banks to grow their business. Have house prices fallen? No. Have rents become more affordable? No.
But the most serious aspect of this policy is the labour package, written by the big economic groups and voiced by the PSD, CDS, Chega and IL parties, which are themselves captured by economic groups and the political expression of employers.
And we already understand the manoeuvre that is underway. In the near future, this or that proposal will be dropped because it is so disgusting that it was only included in the Government's proposal so that it could be dropped.
This move will be sold as a concession, and they will try to start a debate about it, leaving out the main points, the ones that really matter to capital. Those will remain, but they cannot remain.
The labour package cannot be patched up; the only solution is to withdraw each and every one of its 100 measures.
Let the Prime Minister and the advocates of the labour package explain to the youth why, given today's reality where three quarters of new employment contracts are precarious, a reality for 54% of young workers, what they want is even more fixed-term contracts, even more bogus self-employment, even more fragility.
Come face to face with the youth and sell them the virtues of even greater deregulation of working hours.
Do it now to the 2.7 million workers, many of them young, who are already subject to working hours that disrupt their lives.
Explain why they want 50 hours of work per week, more unpaid overtime.
Explain, but explain well, why they want to put even more pressure on wages when, even today, seven out of ten young workers take home less than a thousand euros per month, and while you're at it, explain to those who are already living on the edge the advantage of unfair dismissal.
And don't come up with the argument of strict legislation, because the lives of workers, especially young workers, are already strict and hard.
The labour package is an insult and a theft of young people's life prospects, they want the youth to be subjected to a new form of slavery in order to maintain endless profit accumulation for a minority.
When precariousness is a scourge that affects most young people, limiting wages, weakening rights, hindering access to housing and independent living, the PSD/CDS Government, IL and Chega want to extend precariousness without limits.
But they want more: with unfair dismissals, they are placing all workers in a precarious situation, placing more than 4 million workers under the threat of dismissal and telling young people that they will no longer have the prospect of a permanent contract.
They want employers to be able to decide on working hours and on everyone's personal time, extending working hours and forcing unpaid overtime.
When the rights to organise and participate are already restricted today, they want to isolate each worker, hinder their unity and union organisation, limit the right to strike and weaken the struggle for the better life to which young people are entitled.
No, young people are not doomed to this fate, to this new slavery, to this life of low wages, with no time to live, no right to housing.
No, you are not condemned to this. You have energy, strength and ability, and you will expand the struggle to defeat these regressions and impose what is needed.
What the youth need is a permanent job to correspond to a proper employment contract; what young people need is for every false self-employment contract to become a real employment contract; what the youth need is stability, respect, rights and wages.
We are facing yet another concrete expression of class struggle, further unbalancing the relationship between labour and capital, heightening exploitation and increasing profits.
This is the battle that lies ahead, following the large demonstrations on September 20 and the magnificent March on November 8, which brought more than 100,000 workers to Lisbon.
In the face of this brutal attack, there is only one possible response: to step up the struggle and the General Strike announced by the CGTP-IN for December 11.
A day on which all young people are called upon to play a leading role. All workers, those who create wealth, those who keep the country running, everyone, and in particular the youth, have reasons to say no to the labour package, to build and join the general strike.
On December 11, it will not be a life battle, but it is the better life to which we are entitled that is also at stake.
On December 11, the strength of youth will also be affirmed. This youth counts on the PCP and the JCP to find the conditions in Portugal to study, work and be happy.
The Country needs the strength, creativity, knowledge and joy of youth; no Country can develop without its youth.
We are here to defend the right to work with rights and to free, high-quality public education up to the highest levels.
We are here for the right to healthcare, housing, culture, sport and an ecologically balanced environment.
We are here to fight relentlessly against all forms of discrimination, whether based on sexual identity and orientation, ethnicity, religion or country of origin.
We are here and we will not back down against war and militarism; we are here for Peace.
We are here to fight those who, encouraged by extensive media coverage that promotes them at every turn, give voice to discrimination, hatred and division.
Those who talk about privileges but have nothing to say about the privileges of big capital.
Those who talk about corruption but do not utter a word about the shady deals and crimes of privatisation.
Those who are always full of criticism about benefits, but remain silent, saying nothing about the billions of euros in tax breaks and other support that the largest economic groups suck out of public resources every year.
Those who like to talk about nationality, but give cover to golden visas, which are indeed a wide-open door to the purchase of nationality, corruption and money laundering.
The same people who spread hatred against trade unions in order to serve and protect the interests of employers.
We are concluding the work of the XIII Congress of the Portuguese Communist Youth.
A congress of an organisation that is the Youth Wing of the Communist Party and at the same time an integral part of the youth movement.
An organisation whose leaders and activists are closely linked to the struggles of young people.
Who else could have invited the leaders of the major demonstrations in Higher and Secondary Education that have taken place in recent weeks to speak at their congress?
Or the leaders of the struggles of young workers? Or the struggles for Peace or housing?
Only in the JCP is this possible, and it is possible because here they are, proudly declaring themselves communists and affirming that it is precisely their status as revolutionaries forged in action and struggle that compels them to be connected to the interests and aspirations of young people.
Without this connection to life, it may be possible to do some things and get some things right from time to time, but it is not possible to bring about change.
Connect even more to life, put into practice what you have decided today and start to intervene where it has not yet been possible.
Do even more of what you have been doing, build unity with young people from many backgrounds, without worrying about the political or ideological orientation of this or that person, but rather encouraging them to take initiatives, participate, mobilise more young people and defend their rights, their present and their future.
Keep up this joy of living and fighting, this desire to further strengthen the JCP.
This strengthening is here and was experienced at this Congress, starting with the 700 new recruits, many of whom are certainly here today as delegates or guests.
Young people who were and are key players in the struggle, who were at the demonstrations on National Student Day or National Youth Day, young people who were on the streets on International Women's Day, or in the many actions for Peace and in so many other struggles, and that is how they came to the JCP; young people who participated in electoral battles and took the step of joining, young people who came for the joy, the enthusiasm, the strength, or because they built and experienced that extraordinary collective work that is the Avante! Festival.
To all of you, to all 700 new members, welcome to what is now your organisation.
With you, the JCP is stronger, and that means the youth movement is stronger.
Unite and Fight, this is the path that must be taken at a time when young people need the JCP even more and when the Party needs the JCP to assert itself even more as the revolutionary youth organisation in the daily struggle.
As we saw yesterday in particular, the JCP is here to mobilise and support António Filipe's candidacy for President of the Republic.
António is the President of the youth and its voice, the President who, like the youth, seeks April in their future, the President of each of the articles of the Constitution, of Article 70 on the rights of young people, of Article 65 on the right to housing, of Article 7 on peace, cooperation and solidarity, the President who ensures that the Constitution is upheld and enforced.
Here is the youth force that does not remain silent in the face of the drama of war, militarism and the escalating arms race, and is already mobilising for demonstrations in Lisbon and Oporto in solidarity with Palestine on November 29.
Here is the organisation that is already preparing the General Strike, mobilising all young people for this purpose.
Here is the revolutionary youth organisation for the struggle that continues every day in primary and secondary schools, vocational schools and higher education.
We have said that the situation is demanding and that the bend is tight, but here is the Portuguese Communist Party, your Party, the Party of youth, resistance, courage and hope.
In these times of historical revisionism, here is the PCP, proud of its collective history at the service of the workers, the people and youth. We were the main force of resistance against fascism, we were the main protagonists of the April Revolution and the construction of democracy, we were and are the front line in the fight against the counter-revolution, its right-wing politics and reactionary forces.
In times of manipulation and lies, we reaffirm our ideology, Marxism-Leninism as a guide for action, and our organisation as an instrument for the struggle for the patriotic and left-wing alternative as an immediate task, the advanced democracy and socialism, the communist ideal and project as goals that we want and will achieve.
In times of fear and hatred, we stand with our feet firmly on the ground and with unwavering confidence in the workers, our people and the youth.
We have said that the success of your Congress would be the success of our Party, and so it is, and here we are, immensely proud of the Portuguese Communist Youth.
Your energy, creativity, audacity and joy give us great strength and confidence in the daily struggle and in the revolutionary transformation of society, for that new world that lies in your hands.
We stand firm, united in this struggle, in this dream, in this ideal.
Long live the Unity of the Youth
Long live the Portuguese Communist Youth
Long live the Portuguese Communist Party
