Ffrst steps in democracy
John Vincent-Smith Lisbon ,1Part from the virtual paralysis of the city "t2ring the evening rush-hour and the profusion °' films which the 'Directorate of Shows' (nothing as reactionary as a censor now seems t,0 e(ist) has obligingly designated as containscenes which may shock," thus ensuring tTeir immediate and indeed permanent success, h"e main topic of conversation in Lisbon is the FreParations for the elections next March, b With only four months to go the government "as finally produced its proposals for the law which will govern the organisation and °Peration of political parties during the elections for a constituent assembly. In a c°1•IntrY which has not seen a really free election for a long time (if ever) the law has _naturally provoked a good deal of discussion. Ille number of adherents required to form a cilitical party has been fixed at a surprisingly iar figure of five thousand, and the press is • readY protesting at the rigid and unrealistic restrictions which it is proposed to apply to its ,,l'erage of the campaign. thatust always be remembered, however, tçjthese matters are currently of interest only M Li ,en educated and politicised minority. In thsuon it is easy to overlook the fact that unless 'Lere18 abstention on a huge scale in the Prarnvinces the elections will be decided by that or,,,i°ritY of the population which lives in the tri"ntrY villages and small towns. And despite start made on the political 'enlightenment' rnvt these regions by the Armed Forces Moveinent and other interested parties, as mentioned that previous letter, there is ample evidence or,,t in large parts of the rural centre and north 'eal Political consciousness yet exists at all. l'ocess of scraping a meagre living from a n Plot still absorbs all thought and energy, the least because a considerable proportion of ina active male population of these areas is ki rifling the assembly lines in French factories. -,ean the while the Lisbon press is full of reports of Of „nefarious influence and continuing activity t6' eactionaries' in the far north, and though is s' stories may lose nothing in the telling there edeertainly a colossal task of civic and political II:cal-ion to be undertaken if the face of For.I is to be changed.
an U n ths reason there are people who, despite teg wavering commitment to a democratic rne, seriously ask whether the country can .,,,„81131Y be prepared for elections in March. be frorn a technical point of view there may renrIricous disadvantages in not thoroughly disteinaing the geography of the electoral coin eta inherited from the past. But the eiec,"rni ittnent of the Armed Forces Movement to For °ns, within a year of the famous April 25, iosti,an assembly which would create the port"ntions of a democratic and progressive repellFal seems so deep and is certainly so often signild that it is hard to see now how any orefont delay could be proposed without itent.nndly antagonising or dividing the Move anSdnch a prospect would also arouse the anger WhijnsPicion of the major political parties, The in recent weeks have been very active. toils 'Lncialists, for example, led by the ubiqui
Of elario Soares, have paraded a succession
ahro eIegations of eminent socialists from The,,an, including Willy Brandt and Olof Palme. Chile also fraternally welcomed the exiled the att.s1 socialist leader Carlos Altamirano; but
przolitcrtl:_orntauguese Socialists are not a rY party and only the more extreme rY party and only the more extreme
13' `Heir Marxist wing would want to see his
rhetoric translated into action. There is, however, plenty of room for disagreement within the different sections of the party and all Mario Soares's diploma and oratorical polish may be needed to hold it together on an agreed manifesto for the elections.
The non-Marxist Socialists might well in certain circumstances be tempted towards the expanding parties of the broadly Social-Democratic centre. Here the People's Democratic Party has by no means been inclined to allow the Socialists to monopolise the distinguished visitors from abroad. Its youngest leader Sa Carneiro was close to ex-President Spinola, and the party suffered in the aftermath of the ' general's resignation, but has lately been. reasserting itself intelligently. Not forgetting the difficulties of predicting the rural vote, it is possible that the PPD and the other 'moderate' parties, the Centre for Social Democracy and the recently-formed Portuguese Democratic Movement, will in due course receive a majority of the nation's votes. It is interesting that they generally reject the description 'liberal' as inappropriate and old-fashioned.
To listen to certain sections of foreign opinion here — and not only foreign — one might imagine that a Communist coup was only a matter of weeks or months. This is surely to misunderstand the Communist approach to the present situation. Certainly the party is well-organised in the cities and towns, among the trade unions and in parts of the rural south. Its rallies draw large crowds, in part because it has an inspiring though by no means young leader in Alvaro Cunhal. But it is hard to imagine the Communists aiming or even wanting to take over responsibility for Portugal's problems now or in the foreseeable future. In practice, since they are calculated to have the support of only about one fifth of the electorate, this would mean either confronting the Armed Forces or thoroughly infiltrating them. The first appears out of the question, and while rumours circulate about the second, the Armed Forces Movement resolutely maintains that it is not a political organisation and does not intend to become one, though it may well be represented in some way in the Constituent Assembly. Moreover, though numerous Eastern Bloc delegations have recently visited Portugal — presumably a terra incognita to most of them — to discuss trade, tourism and cultural exchanges, it is a fairly open secret that Mr Brezhnev does not want the Portuguese Communists to try to do anything to upset the de facto balance of power in Europe. In any case their strategic situation for such an attempt could hardly be less promising. On the other hand, because of Portugal's very backwardness, the party has far more scope for devoting its attention to 'gas and water socialism' than even its French and Italian counterparts. It is not likely in the present situation to distract itself with the question of how to seize power, and Cunhal has made it clear to his followers that while the Marxist analysis is always valid the Portuguese, in view of their history since 1928, are not going to rush to welcome the notion of a dictatorship even of the proletariat.
The truth is that the political future is going to depend very largely on the resolution of economic problems whose gravity does not allow time for doctrinaire argument about the abolition of a mixed economy. It is going to depend, to take only one example, on the rescue of Portuguese agriculture and on there being adequate supplies at manageable prices of such staples as bread, milk, fish, oil, and meat. In this sense the interest of the United States, EFTA, and the World Bank in Portuguese development is not only encouraging but vital, as President -Costa Gomes pointed out at the United Nations. It is sometimes said that the First Republic disappeared in 1926 because it could not provide the people with bread. If that is even remotely true it must provide a sober but stimulating moral for the Second.
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