Below is the collection of solidarity messages from fraternal parties and organisations around the world to the 21st National Congress of the Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM).

Australia Asia Worker Links (AAWL)

Australia Asia Worker Links (AAWL) would like to send fraternal greetings to our sisters and brothers of the PSM.

With political uncertainty and economic crisis continuing around the world, the pressure on workers all around the world from the capitalist has not eased. The costs of the global ‘Race to the Bottom’, that capitalists have unleashed, in their drive for ever greater profits, is felt by us every day.

Their profits are literally killing us, whether in our workplaces, in our communities, or in our homes. We are now seeing the rise of far right and fascist organisations in many countries of the world as a new way to divide and attack us.

It is therefore important not only to resist such attacks, but to strengthen and grow our organisations at both the local, the national and international levels. The more united we are, the stronger we will be. Thus, we organise not only improve our conditions but to stop this politics of exploitation, dispossession and wars.

We stand in solidarity with you, your struggles and your endeavours. We wish you, and all of the Malaysian working class, all the best in your work and efforts in the coming period. We look forward to continue our relationship and work with you in future campaigns and struggles.

In unity and solidarity. United we can win. Workers Change the World.

Socialist Alliance, Australia

The Socialist Alliance (Australia) sends its comradely greetings to the 21st Annual National Congress of the Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM).

We wish you a productive conference at this critical juncture where global capitalism is imposing ever greater economic insecurity and division as well as posing a grave risk to human survival though its failure to address the climate emergency.

In Australia, as in elsewhere in the world, this has resulted in greater political polarisation, with the revival of racist and xenophobic right-wing populist politics. In our recent election in May, this helped return the conservative Liberal-National coalition to federal government.

The narrow victory by the Liberal-National Coalition was made easier because of the vacillating and two-faced politics of the Labor party. Further, after the election the Labor party leadership has shifted sharply to the right and assured the capitalist class that it would stop referring to the growing class divide.

A recent study on inequality in Australia found that:

• People in the highest 20% of the wealth scale hold nearly 2/3 of all wealth, while those in the lowest 50% hold only 18% of all wealth.
• The average wealth of a household in the wealthiest 20% is five times that of the middle 20% and almost a hundred times that of the lowest 20%.
• A person in the highest 1% of the income scale lives in a household with an average weekly income that is 26 times the income of someone in the lowest 5% of the income scale. To put it another way – someone in the highest 1% earns more in a fortnight than someone in the lowest 5% earns in an entire year.
• Australia has the 5th highest number in the world of people with ultra high wealth (more than US$50 million).

This month, the Labor MPs in the Australian Parliament shamefully voted with the Liberal-National Coalition government’s bill for the biggest-ever tax cuts for the rich. This bill will also flatten income tax rates, making the tax system flatter than it has been since the 1950s.

Meanwhile, the trade union movement is in political disarray following its mistaken decision to give uncritical support for the Labor party in the last election.

While the working class movement faces challenging times in Australia, there are some bright spots.

First, socialist candidates in the city of Melbourne who ran in the Victorian Socialist electoral alliance scored the highest votes for socialist candidates in a federal election for decades. All three candidates, one of whom was our comrade Sue Bolton, had their electoral deposits returned. There were more modest improvements in our vote in two other states. These results suggest a growing receptivity to socialist politics.

Second, there has been a major upsurge in street action by young people around the climate emergency and other social issues following the global rise of the School Climate Strike late last year. Currently, we are campaigning for the trade union movement to join students in the next big global Climate Strike on September 20.

Other campaigns which the Socialist Alliance has continued to be active in include campaigns of international solidarity with the people’s uprising in Sudan and with the Venezuelan Revolution which is facing a deadly attack from the US Trump Administration in the form of threatened military intervention and a brutal war of economic sanctions which has already cost the lives of 40,000 Venezuelans in 2017-2018.

The Socialist Alliance treasures its comradely links with the PSM and pledges its ongoing solidarity and collaboration.

Capitalism has failed! Socialism is the future!

Landless Workers Movement (MST), Brazil

With great honor and joy we celebrate the 21st Congress of the PSM.

Unfortunately, the global left is facing new and complex challenges all around the world. The rising of a new extreme right – in many cases combined with religious fundamentalism – are pointing to a new phase of neoliberalism and showing the real face of Capital. We see this also in the case of India, USA, Turkey, Brazil, Philippines, and Hungary, among many others.

They’ve been undermining their own bourgeois institutions, but also destroying the rights of the working class that were won through so many struggles.

At the same time, US imperialism felt threatened by the recent attempts to break its absolute hegemony in the past decades. Some new regional and global alliances were able to challenge US absolutism, like BRICS or ALBA in Latin America. This explains their strong reaction in recent years.

They were able to dismantle ALBA and now are doing everything they can to attack and destroy the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela, one of the last resorts of anti imperialistic states we have in the globe. With different methods, they are also attacking Cuba, Iran and China.

We from MST feel that two of the most important tasks of the progressive forces of the working class in this moment in history are:

1) to reorganize our grassroots work among all of the sectors of a “new” working class (which has become much more precarious) in order to be able to elevate the consciousness of our class and to reestablish our power of mobilization for the class struggle,

2) to make all the efforts to fight imperialistic forces wherever we are in the planet and being very conscious of the new tools they are using now, like social media and the manipulation of the judiciary (lawfare), which some are calling “hybrid wars”.

We hope PSM can advance as one of the strongest progressive parties of the region and we expect MST and PSM to be able to strengthen our relations in the next years.

We wish you productive and energized Congress over the weekend.

Socialist regards,

Marco Fernandes on behalf of Landless Workers Movement (MST) and International People’s Assembly

Socialist Popular Alliance Party, Egypt 

On behalf of my comrades in the Socialist Popular Alliance Party (Egypt), I have the honour to congratulate you on the occasion of the 21st Annual National Congress on 12-14 July 2019, in Kajang, the state of Selangor, Malaysia, of the Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM), which continues its courageous struggle for defending the basic rights of the peoples of Malaysia in general, and the disadvantaged and the marginalized in particular.

We, in the Socialist Popular Alliance Party, cordially wish that the PSM Congress will succeed in accomplishing its important tasks. We follow up, with great admiration and appreciation, the activities of the PSM, especially in supporting the farmers’ struggle for land rights, and in combating various forms of exploitation and oppression suffered by workers and other popular masses as a result of the savage policies of capitalism.

We highly appreciate the fruitful cooperation between our party and the PSM, and look forward to strengthen the relations between the two parties in the future. We are certain that our solidarity is of great importance for addressing the global and regional threats posed by the Imperialist forces which continue to spread aggression and destruction worldwide. Both our parties are now cooperating in building the new form of unity of the left forces all over the world, the task that appears as the most important to save humanity from the danger of decaying capitalism. Both our parties understand well the utmost necessity of combining the local, regional and global struggle.

Long live the solidarity of the peoples of Malaysia and Egypt

Long live the struggle of the peoples for Freedom, Justice, Equality and Human Dignity

LONG LIVE INTERNATIONALISM

Nouveau Parti anticapitaliste (NPA), France 

We thank you for your message, and we are happy to send you from France this message of solidarity from the New Anti-Capitalist Party (NPA) on the occasion of your congress.

In the difficult global situation that we are all experiencing, we welcome your efforts to develop international links between anti-capitalist organizations, and more particularly in the recent period, the responsibility you have taken for an international campaign of solidarity with the extraordinary popular movement in Hong Kong against oppression and the repression trying to strangle it.

More than ever, we believe it is essential to link our struggles and our solidarity at the international level, against the offensives aimed at crushing the peoples and against the imperialist support for these offensives, wherever they come from. Capitalists export their wars, their weapons, their commodities and their capital, but they deny all aspirations to social justice, democratic freedoms, the dignity of peoples and the preservation of an endangered environment.

Nevertheless, resistance against anti-popular policies, widespread austerity, against racism, sexism and against turns to authoritarianism are expressed everywhere. In France, in the political confusion and the crisis of the institutional parties, the movement of the Yellow Vests has, for many months, shaken the pretention of the president Macron to impose by a forced march a new weakening of labor laws, of public services and all social rights, which are provoking unprecedented social and geographical marginalization in this country. Important social movements have also manifested themselves in strikes and in the streets (hospitals, education, youth for the climate …), undergoing a growing repression. They are encouraging us to redouble our efforts to unite the working classes, the people and the youth in an offensive struggle, and to obtain major setbacks of a regime with weak legitimacy, to lay the foundations for an anti-capitalist, feminist and eco-socialist alternative.

The challenge for anti-capitalists throughout the world is to defeat the policies pursued by illegitimate powers and their institutions, but it is also to stop the extreme right, the xenophobes and the religious ultra-reactionaries from benefiting from this social exasperation. It is therefore to give a new visibility and credibility to a global emancipation project for the world of today, towards a break with the policies of international financial institutions and with the established predatory and corrupt powers. Both our organizations share these concerns.

Dear comrades, we hope that your congress will be fruitful and we are awaiting your analyses and decisions with interest.

Die Linke, Germany

We send our best solidarity wishes for your 21^st Annual National Congress. We wish good debates and discussion.

In this world we need strong left movements, able to work together with others – with workers, NGOs, other movements – to combine forces. With climate change becoming a more evident problem, it is becoming more and more and more obvious, that we need to change the system. It will not be the industrialized West but the Global South, who will suffer most.

So it also our duty in the fight for social justice, to work harder against climate change.

We need to fight together with others for social rights, social justice, climate justice, sustainability and peace. Let’s work on this together all over the world.

Borderless Movement, Hong Kong

Greeting from Hong Kong!

We are delighted to hear that your annual conference will soon be convened, reminding us of your more than two decades long struggle in Malaysia.

It is a time of both crisis and opportunities. Here in Hong Kong, the storming of the legislature and its subsequent occupation on 1st July constitutes another climax of the anti-China Extradition Bill movement. It is the voice of the young generation who has been denied a fair voice in the society, a voice which has won the heart of more than half of the population. The Carrie Lam government and its Beijing backer are morally and politically bankrupt. The people today continues the struggle by spreading even more Lennon walls to the community, in the face of harassment and attack from the opponent camp.

We still remember our excitement when we heard of the news that your party launched a solidarity statement with Hong Kong. This is the genuine expression of international solidarity.

We wish you every success of your conference. We know the difficulty of being a minority current in the society. And we stand by you in your upholding of the value of democracy and equality which we all share.

Forward, our comrades!

League of Social Democrats, Hong Kong

We, the League of Social Democracy of Hong Kong (LSD), are expressing our solidarity and congratulation to our comrade Socialist Party of Malaysia (PSM) for its 21st Annual National Congress.

It is quite an extraordinary efforts for PSM to go through all the ups and downs of Malaysian social movement, and keep on building a leftwing grass-root movement. Despite recent setback in 2018 national election, PSM proves itself vigorous and determinate enough to uphold its goal. The end of the 61 years ruling of National Front by people power, and the instability of the new ruling coalition give us a chance but also a challenge to reconstruct the left wing alternative on a more broad and solid basis.

The same as in Hong Kong, the mass mobilization against extradition bill to China is facing a critical moment. Nearly one third of Hong Kong people took to the streets to express their objection to the bill but the Hong Kong government turn a blind eye and tries to use police forces to depress the movement. Despite recently HK government announced that the extradition bill will not be legislated in near future while facing mounting discontent, the democratic movement and the demand for universal suffrage in HK is still an uphill battle and will need more international supports.

Therefore, it is time for the left wing parties and organizations all around the world to strength our solidarity.

Hope you have a successful conference.

Long Live International Solidarity

Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Liberation, India

The CPIML (Liberation) extends warm fraternal greetings to all comrades of the PSM on the occasion of your 21st Congress.

At a time when there is a global trend of the rise of far-right and fascist forces, there is an urgent need for greater unity and cooperation amongst left forces.

The climate change crisis is underlining the fact that fighting capitalism is a must if our planet is to survive.

We look forward to working with PSM to strengthen the Left movement all over the world.

Wishing you all success in your 21st Congress.

Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Red Star, India

Congratulations on the holding of your 21st Annual Conference. We hope that this Conference will enable you to take bold steps forward in building a socialist movement in your country and help the people’s movement in the whole world. We look forward to getting the results and documents of the conference as soon as possible.

Today, the world is passing through a critical phase. On the one hand the crisis of international capitalism remains constant. The only solution seen by the world imperialist-capitalist system is the neo-liberal policies. As the crisis grows ever more acute, they have no further solutions other than even more of the neo-liberal policies. These consist of helping large capital and big corporate houses to make ever more profits. For this they have to be allowed to exploit workers and nature in a wanton and unbridled manner.

Though the masses are suffering the results of these neo-liberal policies and are fighting against their effects in the streets, the left today is in a very vulnerable position. The masses are more frequently turning to the right and the ultra-right in their search for a remedy. The ultra-right using ideas like religious fanaticism and national chauvinism is able to hoodwink the masses. The left has to come up with new ideas very fast to attract the youth and other oppressed masses of the world. We hope that your conference will be a long stride in this direction.

We have always seen the PSM as a close fraternal organisation and wish to further this relationship. As members of ICOR we are trying to build an international front of revolutionary organisations and, at present, we are engaged, with ILPS in trying to build up an anti-imperialist front. We hope that we will have an opportunity to talk to PSM about this very soon.

Congratulations once again and wishing the best success to your conference.

Partai Pembebasan Rakyat, Indonesia

Salam Pembebasan, Kepada Forum Kongres dan Kawan-kawan Kader Partai Sosialis Malaysia yang kami sayangi,

Dunia kapitalisme mengalami krisis. Tidak hanya di Asia Tenggara, tapi secara keseluruhan. Namun, tidak serta merta Kapitalisme berganti menjadi Sosialisme. Sosialisme sebagaimana takdir sejarah hanya mungkin dicapai melalui kerja keras bersama kelas pekerja dan rakyat miskin melalui suatu Revolusi yang tak terinterupsi.

Bahkan kita melihat, sekali lagi, tak hanya di Asia Tenggara, krisis Kapitalisme belum membuahkan penguatan kekuatan kiri-sosialis secara umum. Di banyak negara dan wilayah kekuatan ultra kanan bertambah kuat bahkan berkuasa, sebagaimana kita lihat di beberapa negara di Amerika Latin (Brazil, Chili, dll), di India, Amerika Serikat dan lainnya.

Di Indonesia, kekuatan kanan bertarung dengan kekuatan ultra kanan, dengan kedok nasionalisme chauvinis vs konservatisme agama. Kiri memang belum signifikan secara politik. Namun ditengah ketidakpuasaan rakyat pada keadaan politik hari ini harapan alternatif sedang tumbuh dan butuh untuk dipupuk agar semakin besar dan kuat.

Namun pertanyaannya adalah bagaimana membuat potensi alternatif yang dilahirkan atas ketidakpuasaan dan kemuakan rakyat pada keadaan politik dan sistem hari ini dapat diolah menjadi kekuatan politik kiri-sosialis?

Tentu kita akan kembali kepada soal-soal memperkuat Partai serta alat-alat politiknya dan ketepatan strategi-taktik berserta agitasi propaganda programatiknya.

Tanpa itu semua, sangat sulit mengolah potensi politik hari ini berujung pada penguatan gerakan kiri-sosialis.

Namun, syarat untuk memperkuat Partai, alat-alat politik Partai, beserta strategi-taktik dan agitasi-propaganda yang tepat adalah bagaimana terus menerus memperbaiki kualitas Partai.

Dan memperbaiki kualitas Partai bermakna memperbaiki kualitas anggota-anggota Partai baik secara ideologi, mental juang, maupun kemampuannya dalam praktek perjuangan kesehariaan.

Partai adalah sebuat alat perjuangan untuk mewujudkan cita-cita. Alat yang baik dan kuat akan mempercepat terwujudnya cita-cita tersebut. Partai/Alat yang baik dan kuat berisi kader-kader yang kuat, tulus, yang mengabdikan sepenuhnya hidup untuk perjuangan cita-cita: Sosialisme.

Semoga kongres dapat menajamkan kesimpulan atas analisasi situasi, merumuskan strategi-taktik dan agitas propaganda yang tepat, dan memperbaiki serta memperkuat Partai.  Selamat Berkongres!

Hormat Diberi…

Potere al Popolo!, Italy

We are glad to send this solidarity message to your 21st national congress.

When comrades from different parts of the world are able to get in touch, to share their experience, the struggles they’re carrying on, their victories and their defeats, it’s always exciting. To create this kind of connections it’s a step forward towards our main, final goal: the breakup of every kind of exploitation, the overcoming of capitalism as system of social relationships, the building of a better and fairer society – we can just collect all this issues under the name “socialism”.

But what’s happening right now it’s particularly interesting: this message travels from Italy to Malaysia, from Western Europe to south-east Asia, that is to say between two countries which are 10.000 kms far from each other and share neither language, nor history or tradition. The only – at the same time, the main – thing we share is that we live in capitalist societies and that we try everyday to fight against it, in order to create something new. The societies we live in are surely different, but we’re part of the same world-system. Both our countries are ruled by right-wing governments. Both our organizations are trying to build socialism through grassroots work and political organization from below, helping people to solve they needs, working with them in order to make socialism an achievable aim and a word we can once again pronounce and shout together.

You’re now facing an important moment of your political activity: you’re putting your efforts in building a left alternative in Malaysia, and during this Congress you are going to discuss how to strengthen your organization, therefore how to strengthen the left movement in your country, as well as in South-east Asia and in the whole world. That is to say, we are looking forward to see your next steps because they are going to strengthen even us!

Furthermore, despite of the distance between our countries some militants of our organizations have already known each other. That means that we could have the chance to put theory into practice, to transform these still rhetorical greetings into durable practice. So, we hope to continue to build a relationship and to let this solidarity message develop into a stronger and deeper common political work, which forms, approaches and even practical goals are still to be brought into focus – we can try to do it together, from this moment forward.

Hidup Rakyat!

Power to the people!

Potere al popolo!

Awami Workers Party, Pakistan

On the eve of 21 st congress of Malaysian Socialist Party, the Awami Workers Party sends its fraternal greetings and express solidarity with the great work done by over the years.

As one of main effort to present an alternative Pakistan on Socialist basis, PSM struggle for an alternative Malaysia is a great step towards building a Socialist Malaysia. We must present a new vision of our countries based on the Socialist ideas in response to the capitalist crisis.

We also hope that PSM would be struggling to combat the menace of religious fundamentalism in the country. It has become one of the major challenges to the countries where Muslims are in absolute majority. Religious fundamentalism must be fought on all fronts.  This is one of main priority of AWP in Pakistan.

PSM is like a sister organisation to AWP. We have great respect for your role in helping Pakistani immigrants in Malaysia. Our late president Fanoos Gujjar was very fond of PSM and he also visited PSM office and spoke at a public meeting here.

We would continue to keep our close relationship with PSM.

With Revolutionary Greetings, Long live Socialist Revolution.

Workers World Party, USA

Workers World Party would like to send greetings of solidarity to those attending the 21st Annual Congress of the PSM.

One can see from the PSM website that the people of Malaysia are struggling for many of the same demands as the working class of the United States is. For example, better health care, housing for all, and education as a right for all the people are demands that the PSM puts right atop the first page. With these demands are the demands to combat climate change and find renewable sources of energy, which are so important to the existence of the earth and the human race.

It is inspiring to us in the center of world imperialism to see a party like the PSM carrying the banner of socialism and presenting a socialist solution to the problems of the workers and farmers of the world.

We can also see that we are shoulder-to-shoulder with the PSM in its defense of Bolivarian Venezuela against the constant attacks by U.S. imperialism. We will be demonstrating this coming weekend on the important issue of stopping U.S. imperialism from attacking Iran and Venezuela, along with defending the rights of migrants to enter the United States.

Long live international solidarity.

Fourth International

Dear comrades, with this message the Fourth International wants to wish you success in your twelfth annual congress. Several members of the Fourth International have had the privilege of attending your Socialism conferences, and to become familiar with your work in building a socialist movement in Malaysia. We have been impressed by your success in growing social roots and in building your party in difficult political circumstances. We have seen how the PSM combines the struggle for immediate reforms with that for social transformation, and how it combines social-economic demands with an awareness of the increasing climate crisis. Its dedication to grass roots organizing and to socialist principles make the PSM a true champion of the Malaysian popular classes.

As the climate crisis intensifies and the global capitalist system remains fragile, we are seeing worldwide an increase of reactionary and anti-democratic forces. Socialists in Malaysia and worldwide are facing new challenges. The Fourth International is committed to working together with other socialists in building the movements and parties that we need to meet these challenges. We are certain the PSM will continue to be a true defender of the interests of the popular classes. We are looking forward to learning the results of your congress, and to build more exchange and contact with the PSM in the future.