From the extreme left
http://www.apk2000.dk/english/kp-international/kpint2003/2003-kpint0927-swedeneuro.htmlYes to Denmark’s Withdrawal from the EU
By Klaus Riis, Editor of Kommunistisk Politik. From Kommunistisk Politik, No. 19, September 27, 2003.
“The Swedish “no” to the euro at the referendum on September 14 will not have any consequences for Denmark,” Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen said at the evening of the referendum, commenting on it.
Ever since, Fogh Rasmussen and the pro-EU parties have been thinking like crazies. Naturally, the Swedish “no” has encouraged the Danish anti-EU movement as well as the Norwegian, which again enjoys a majority against EU membership in opinion polls.
First Fogh Rasmussen thought of making a referendum on Denmark’s opt-out on justice – not on its abolition, but on a change which would mean that the national parliament could abolish it – together with the promised referendum on the EU constitution [now officially, imprecisely and falsely being called the “EU Treaty” in the media]. Then he let a “bomb” detonate at a debate meeting at the University of Aarhus, as he declared: “A “no” at the referendum will mean Denmark’s withdrawal from the EU.”
During the evening, he got the support of all the pro-EU parties: If the Danes vote “no” to the EU constitution next year, this will in reality mean that Denmark withdraws from the EU. They all protest that it is not an April fool in September.
But there is not the slightest reason for believing them. If the result of the referendum, where the question is – if not formally then at least politically – a clear choice between continued EU membership or not, would be a “no”, then all the pro-EU parties will try to do whatever they can to sabotage this “no” and hinder Danish withdrawal from the EU, just as they did not respect the “no” to the Nice Treaty in 1992, the four opt-outs of 1993 as a result of the forced second referendum, or the “no” to the euro in 2000. In this last referendum, 53.1 percent voted against the euro and 46.9 percent for it. The Danes clearly said “no thanks” to the euro with an electoral participation of 87.5 percent.
It was the same majority of Danes, having the majority of the political parties, the employer’s organisations, the top of the Danish Trade Confederation, all the media and the money against them, who beat them all and won at the referendums; it was the same majority who have been threatened, lured and lied for, and despite of that, have rejected all new steps of the project of the monopolies, “The United States of Europe”.
Ever since, setting aside the decisions of the majority of the Danish people has been the objective of the EU policy of the pro-EU parties.
They cannot do anything else. It is their nature. Of course, they maintain that they represent the whole nation and the interests of the people, but after all their purpose is to look after the interests of capital and the capitalist state which are opposed to both immediate and long-term interests of the workers and the great majority and opposed to the national interest in independence and independent development.
There is no reason for believing them an inch. They will never respect a “no”.
Of course, Fogh Rasmussen’s statement on Denmark’s withdrawal from the EU in case of a “no” has been arranged with the parliamentary supporting party of the government, the Danish People’s Party, which raised the same question on its national congress. That is the game being played. The Danish People’s Party does not want Denmark’s withdrawal from the EU. It is not a secret admirer of Norway. Being an ultrareactionary party in every aspect, its heart beats for the US, the Bush administration and its imperialist campaign against Muslims and the world’s poor countries and peoples.
As a populist party, the Danish People’s Party has always been sponging on the opposition to the EU which was strong, broad and popular, not at least in the working class, long before Pia Kjaersgaard [national leader of the Danish People’s Party, translator’s note] and the Danish People’s Party were invented, at the time when Mogens Glistrup and his Progress Party [founded in 1972 from which the Danish People’s Party came into being in 1995, translator's note] were among the happy pro-EU parties.
Now, the Danish People’s Party is being portrayed as the “Out of EU-party number one”. It has never been that, nor will it ever be, but this image will drive EU-sceptics to the pro-EU camp and strengthen the Danish People’s Party, and not anything else.
If the Prime Minister and the pro-EU parties are serious, let them – and they have a majority in the national parliament – formulate the ballot paper with the options of voting for the EU constitution or Denmark’s withdrawal from the EU. This would be plain language. The anti-EU movement would also be able to win such a referendum because the majority of the Danes and the Danish nation are better off outside both European and US imperialism, being independent and open for positive relations with all the countries and peoples of the world.
The consistent, popular and class-based opposition to the EU must not be scared by the pro-EU camp turning the referendum into a referendum on the Danish EU membership. Nor should it be silent about the fact that the great majority of Danes will benefit from Denmark being outside the club of the monopolies. Leave it to the Socialist People’s Party and the June Movement to swear to continued EU membership even though they are opponents [of part] of the EU constitution. Let them make their horse trading in the form of national compromises, and let us instead mobilise for a clear class “no” and a clear popular “no” to the constitution of the EU superstate and superpower and for Denmark’s withdrawal from this bad company.
