With great respect and deeply moved we remember the 100^th anniversary of LENIN’s day of death. We share this great respect and this profound emotion with millions of communists, revolutionaries and proletarians, who the world over rightly view LENIN as their inspirer and guide. LENIN is the worthy and faithful successor of MARX and ENGELS who worked tirelessly not only to preserve the scientific truth of Marxism, but also to ensure its further development under new conditions, in a new era.

LENIN understood how to work out the main features of this new era: the epoch of imperialism, i.e., the epoch in which capitalism has become a dying system whose contradictions, as seen by Marx and Engels at their time, have become more acute, leading to the necessity and inevitability of a proletarian world revolution and the emergence of a new system, the socialist system; the epoch in which capitalism has developed into a system of global domination, where the struggle for liberation of the enslaved, colonial and dependent peoples therefore connects with the struggle of the proletariat for socialism, in the common struggle against the world domination of capital; the period in which the revolution can break out in any weak link in the chain of capital’s world domination, and the construction of socialism can only be an undertaking of one country or a group of countries. In short, it is the time of open class conflicts, the time when the proletarian revolution has become practice against an utterly reactionary bourgeoisie and in which revolutionary violence is on the agenda.

The merit of LENIN and Leninism is to have recorded and analyzed the basic features of this epoch of imperialism, to have demonstrated the necessity of the proletarian revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat, and to have forged consequently that party that is capable of leading the working class and guiding the revolutionary process under these conditions: a party which has ideologically, theoretically, politically and organizationally equipped itself and has the strategic and tactical capability to hold course in any situation, at turning points, in advances as well as setbacks, in offense and defense, to combine legal and illegal work – this task was accomplished through hard ideological, theoretical, political and organizational struggle, a struggle won against different hindering opportunist and liquidationist currents. Most of these currents, which had evolved in the last decades, were: legal Marxism, Populism, Economism, Menshevism, Otsovism, Kautskyism, and forms of Trotskyism.

It is right that Josef STALIN called Leninism the Marxism of the epoch of imperialism and that communists today call themselves Marxist-Leninists.

The October Revolution provided concrete evidence of the scientific truth of Marxism-Leninism as a science of the proletarian revolution and the dictatorship of the proletariat, based on the alliance of the working class, the poor peasantry and the exploited masses. This truth was verified by the victory of the Red Army, the armed arm of the dictatorship of the proletariat and the concrete embodiment of this alliance, over the imperialist (German, American, French, Japanese) and counterrevolutionary forces that had united to defeat and liquidate the new Soviet power.

It was also the victory of Marxism-Leninism in both the theory and practice of real and consistent proletarian internationalism; more concretely: it was the result of the right decision by Lenin and the Bolsheviks, in accordance with the resolution of the 2^nd International, to wage “war on war”, to reject the war loans and dismiss the slogan of the “holy Union”, the dead end into which all other parties of the 2^nd International had run, and to transform the imperialist war into a revolution.

The victory of the October Revolution dealt opportunism and chauvinism in the international proletariat a serious blow. That led to splits and the establishment of new parties that put their faith in Leninism; it awakened enormous hopes and contributed to the rise of emancipation movements, in particular in China, Indochina and North Africa; it awakened enormous hopes in the international proletariat and made the Soviet Republic a bulwark of the struggle for liberation and socialism.

Indisputably, the Soviet Union provided evidence of the superiority of socialism through its mere existence and its victories in the construction of socialist society. More than ever, the October Revolution became the source of inspiration for the international proletariat and the oppressed peoples of the world. The great and decisive role played by the Soviet Union in the suppression of fascism had strengthened its sympathy among the masses: Eastern Europe, which had been liberated from the Nazi occupation, struck the socialist path; the peoples of the dependent countries renewed their efforts in their emancipatory struggles, especially in Asia (with China and Indochina) and North Africa (with the demonstrations of Setif in Algeria) and in sub-Saharan Africa. … A large part of the world was now member of the socialist camp and escaped the grasp of imperialism, thanks to Lenin’s teachings and Stalin’s fidelity to these lessons, to Marxism-Leninism.

Today, however, it must be noted that the revolutionary movement has suffered a certain setback. The socialist camp has collapsed, capitalism has been restored and anchored in by the counterrevolution in Russia and the European people’s democracies; the openly imperialist China spreads out worldwide (the “belt and road initiative”) and participates shamelessly in rivalries with other imperialists for the plundering of the world’s peoples.

The main reason for this situation today is the development of revisionism, which after Stalin’s death finally took over the party and the state; this new, revisionist course, officially rung in at the 20th Party Congress of the CPSU, is reflected in the betrayal of everything Marxism-Leninism and the October Revolution taught, under the guise of a return to Lenin.

Thus, the principles of the dictatorship of the proletariat were replaced by the concept of a state of the whole people and the transition to socialism without a proletarian revolution; the principle of the party of the working class was replaced by the concept of the party of the whole people; the principle of the antagonistic fundamental contradiction, and as a result, inexorable struggle between socialism and capitalism, was replaced by the concept of peaceful competition.

In colonial, neocolonial and dependent colonial countries, the principle of democratic revolution under the leadership of the working class as step towards socialism was replaced by the concept of the “state of national democracy”, which misleads the working class in the name of an alleged “non-capitalist development” to run behind the bourgeoisie; lest we forget the three-world theory, no less from China, according to which the people of the “second and third worlds” are to unite with their bourgeoisie against the “first world”.

Thus, the restoration of capitalism in socialist countries has not only taken a bastion and a base from the international proletariat; it was also accompanied by developments, theories and doctrines, which did nothing but create confusion and disarm the international proletariat and the oppressed peoples of the world against the bourgeoisie.

These are developments and theories that led parties invoking communism to embrace a policy of class collaboration and thus left the international proletariat and the peoples without protection, who were to suffer terrible massacres, especially in Indonesia, Sudan and Chile. In many colonial, neocolonial and dependent countries such as ours, these theories even had the result that the need for the leadership of the democratic revolution by the proletariat was denied and that the proletariat and the masses of the people remained confused without the leadership of the communist party, whose founding was postponed indefinitely, as it was no longer regarded as an important task. Those who still dared to invoke Marxism at that time were in this way able to justify their integration into the bourgeois movements and their participation in the neocolonial and dependent regimes.

It was therefore this momentary setback for socialism which gave free hand to the bourgeoisie, who was more arrogant than ever, to the opportunists and revisionists of all kinds, to carry out an unrestrained propaganda in order, using lies, to present socialism as monstrous barbarism, or, at best, as an impossible dream, to try to present the October Revolution as a mere accident of history, as a mere interlude in a world which is eternally dedicated to the rule of capitalism, and to have the Russian monopolist and imperialist bourgeoisie speak today of alleged “mistakes of Lenin’s”.

However, we other communists are convinced that this is a temporary situation and that this cannot always remain so. For we know that material reality is in constant change, that everything that exists develops and dies, whether it is nature or society, regardless of the will of people who, while accelerating or slowing down the process, cannot prevent it from happening. This is what LENIN and dialectical materialism teach us. We therefore know with certainty that the bourgeoisie and capitalism, which have not always existed, which emerged and developed in the lap of feudal society, which they finally destroyed and replaced, will also disappear.

And we have learned the great lesson that LENIN has left us through his position and attitude in the period of the tsarist reaction after the failure of the revolution of 1905.

For whether it is called globalization or otherwise, the present time is still indisputably the time of capital concentration, of the monopolies of finance capitalism, of the domination of the world by a small number of powers; in short, it is still the time of imperialism, and the contradictions of imperialism, as perceived and analyzed by LENIN, are – not only – still present, but only exacerbate, and socialism more and more appears as the necessary and inevitable solution. In fact, production has never been so much socialized and capital has never been in so few hands. The crisis of capitalism has become a constant reality.

In the imperialist countries, the working class and the toiling masses are experiencing growing poverty as a result of endemic unemployment and the questioning of the social rights achieved. In view of their justified dissatisfaction, the bourgeoisie is resorting to an increased militarization of society, to questioning of freedoms and to measures of fascistization under pressure of increasingly legitimated fascist groups that are taking up more and more room on the political stage. More than ever, LENINS’s statement that imperialism is reaction all along the line is up to date.

In neocolonial and dependent countries such as ours, the influence of monopoly capital has led to a greater dependence on the neocolonial state and even a form of recolonization. This leads to more misery for the people and especially for young people, who sometimes see no other way out than to emigrate; but also to more fighting spirit, which sometimes leads to terrorism, but also strengthens the will for independence.

The inter-imperialist rivalries have in particular aggravated with the rise of new imperialist countries. They have multiplied the conflicts, intensified the arms race, and put the world into an almost permanent state of war. Only socialism can create peace between the peoples.

In addition, there are the ecological catastrophes that are a consequence of the capitalist exploitation of the resources of the earth. Only socialism can save humanity. The intensification of these contradictions makes the socialist revolution inevitable. Somewhere the chain of imperialist rule will eventually tear. Moreover, recent events in various countries (Tunisia, Egypt and Burkina Faso) show that the peoples are not willing to bear the situation imposed on them, and that they are lacking only organization and a resolute leadership.

The great teaching that we can draw from all these events is the topicality of Lenin’s teachings of Marxism-Leninism; it is the necessity of the proletarian revolution and also the necessity of the communist party, which alone can lead the working class to make this revolution possible. It is this party that, following the example of the Bolshevik Party and with all the experience that the proletariat has collected, can lead to victory. It is therefore our duty to strengthen our parties by taking inspiration from Lenin’s teachings, from the example of the Bolshevik Party, but also from the accumulated experiences of the international proletariat, through increased internationalist exchange and mutual support.

ETERNAL GLORY FOR LENIN!

LING LIVE MARXISM-LENINISM, THE ALWAYS UP-TO-DATE SCIENCE!

LONG LIVE PROLETARIAN INTERNATIONALISM!

Lomé, 15 August 2024

The Communist Party of Togo, Party of Revolution