• #SomosComunistas (We Are Communists) Tweets trended for hours Tuesday
• PCE response to positioning ‘Unidos Podemos’ as ‘social democrat’ formation
Less than 24 hours after Podemos party leader Pablo Iglesias insisted that the new Unidos Podemos electoral coalition formed with the Izquierda Unida (IU, United Left) alliance was essentially a new “social democrat” formation, the rank and file of the IU-alliance-member Spanish Communist Party (PCE) responded Tuesday with thousands of trending messages on Twitter under the hashtag #SomosComunistas (We Are Communists), clearing up any misconception about their willingness to go along quietly disguised as social democrats.
Speaking before business leaders at the Nueva Economía Fórum (New Economy Forum) at Madrid’s Hotel Ritz on Monday, Iglesias said that the Unidos Podemos coalition is poised to overtake the Socialist party (PSOE) in the 26th June general elections and occupy what he called the “new social-democrat space” in Spain. Asked about the importance of Communist Party participation in the new coalition, the Podemos leader attempted to downplay its significance by coyly noting that the authors of the “Communist Manifesto”, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, were actually just social democrats in their time.
On Tuesday, PCE activists shot back via Twitter with tens of thousands of messages letting the Podemos leader know they are proud of their Communist beliefs and activism and apparently have no intention of becoming social democrats. In one message from the official account of the party’s Communist Youth organization, the PCE made its position very clear: “Faced with layoffs, (job) insecurity and exploitation, we will not hide. We are Communists and we will confront capitalism.”
► Read More in Spanish at El Mundo and ABC …
