February the 8th 2021 – the centenary of the birth of Nexhmije Xhuglini (Hoxha)

Posted on by
1
Nexhmije Hoxha

Nexhmije Hoxha

More on the ‘Revolutionary Year’

More on Albania ……

View of the world

Ukraine – what you’re not told

February the 8th 2021 – the centenary of the birth of Nexhmije Xhuglini (Hoxha)

On 7th April 1939 the Italian Fascists landed an invasion force in the port city of Durres and the Albanian people (led by those who considered themselves Communists) organised a demonstration in Tirana calling upon the self-crowned ‘King’ Zog to arm the people and resist the invaders. Nexhmije was one of those demonstrators.

In response to the invasion Zog ran away and spent the rest of the Second World War in luxury and safety in Britain while the country of his birth was occupied by first the Italian and then the German Fascists.

Barely out of her teens, on 8th November 1941, Nexhmije was one of the founding members of the Albanian Communist Party along with Qemal Stafa (who became leader of the Party’s Youth section – of which Nexhmije was also a member) and Enver Hoxha, later to become leader of the Party and the country.

Following the occupation Nexhmije was involved in the production and distribution of anti-fascist propaganda, mainly in the Tirana area, working in the youth section as well as being a women’s organiser.

For a couple of years there was no united resistance movement to the invaders – although various guerrilla groups made life as uncomfortable as possible for the fascists. There were also many demonstrations, in various parts of the country, where unarmed Albanians took to the streets protesting against the occupation, such as the demonstration of college students and teachers on 6th March 1942 in Gjirokaster.

On 16th September 1942 a conference was held in the farm of Myslym Peza, a few kilometres to the west or Tirana, called and organised by the young Communist Party, where the National Liberation Front was established, which, eventually was successful in clearing both the Italian Fascists and the German Nazis from the country.

Nexhmije Xhuglini

Nexhmije Xhuglini

In her early twenties Nexhmije joined the Partisans fighting the invaders, as did many young women in the country at the time. The example of Liri Gero and the 68 girls from Fier being a prime example of this. Young Albanian women decided that if they wanted to achieve freedom then it had to be fought for by themselves rather than it being bestowed upon them by men at some time in the indeterminate future.

Final victory over the German Nazis was achieved with the liberation of Tirana on the 29th of November 1944. Albania being one of the few countries in the Second World War who liberated themselves without the aid of either the Soviet Red Army from the east or the forces of the British and Americans coming from the west.

Having fought and struggled together with Enver Hoxha in the partisan movement Nexhmije married him in 1945 and from then on was known as Nexhmije Hoxha.

After liberation she became chair of the Albanian Women’s Union and in the early 1950s she was elected to the Central Committee of the Party of Labour of Albania (which the Albanian Communist Party had renamed itself after 1948).

In 1966, after the ten-year long struggle against revisionism within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and other parties in the International Communist Movement, Nexhmije became the head of the Marxist-Leninist Institute. This was a school for Party cadres and was an important, and crucial, development in the struggle within the Party to oppose revisionism and the re-introduction of capitalism within the country.

This was at the time which can be called Albania’s ‘Cultural Revolution’. This revolution was not as extensive as the very well-known Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in China, not least because the population of the country was much smaller and had, literally, many enemies right at their borders.

This was a struggle of ideas and this was the time when much of the anti-revisionist, revolutionary material produced in Albania started to be published, translated into various other languages and distributed worldwide.

In 1985 Enver Hoxha died. However, Nexhmije continued to play an important role within the Party and country. However, the increased isolation in a hostile world, which followed the counter-revolutionary coup in China after the death of Comrade Mao Tse-tung, meant that the economic situation became untenable and allowed reactionary forces to use the people’s discontent to rally against the Party and all those in the leadership.

Chaos and anarchy took control of Albania and in 1991 Nexhmije was put on trial as a scapegoat for those in power at that time to hide their inability to run the country – along capitalist lines and even with the support and backing of the capitalist and imperialist nations.

Nexhmije Hoxha 1991

Nexhmije Hoxha 1991

She was accused of embezzlement of government funds and ludicrous stories were spread by the reactionaries in an effort to make her conviction more convincing.

Anyone who has visited Tirana and has seen the building which used to be the home and the office of Enver Hoxha and his family will realise that this was not a family which surrounded itself with luxury, as is the case and the norm in capitalist countries. It’s a modest, two storey building – which people can actually enter part of nowadays as one side of it is a cafe.

Enver Hoxha's Residence and Office in Tirana

Enver Hoxha’s Residence and Office in Tirana

No evidence was ever presented of a luxurious lifestyle. If they were living in the sort of luxury it was claimed, then images of that would have been presented many years ago.

Even when Comrade Enver left Tirana to holiday in the mountains he stayed in, again, a very modest building in Peshkopia which is no more than a large, family house. People can actually stay in this building now as, for a number of years now the building has been used as a cheap hostel. This just goes to show that the claims of a luxurious lifestyle are hardly proven.

Summer House - Peshkopia

Summer House – Peshkopia

When Nexhmije died on 26th February 2020 she was really one of the last people who would have been around at the time to actively fight against the fascist invaders and then, after liberation, attempting to construct socialism in Albania. Her death was really a definitive break between the present era and the construction of socialism.

Although being a small country, in the 1960s and 70s Albania was able to construct a modern agricultural system based upon state farms and an industrial base which produced much that the country needed – following the concept of self-reliance.

All that capitalism has given to Albania in the last thirty years is the destruction of all those factories which produced so much. For Albanians the largest export the country has now is its people.

There are some who now consider the exploitation of the extensive mineral resources of Albania, although located in the more inaccessible parts of the country, is the way ‘forward’ but this will just turn it into a producer of prime materials. All the real profits from such a move would be gained by huge transnational companies and other foreign financial institutions.

Albania now has no real leadership which isn’t corrupt, inept and more intent on currying favour with the European Union than it is in working for the interests of the Albanian people.

Nexhmije, along with many other members of the Party of Labour of Albania, struggled – between 1944 and 1990 – to construct something which would mean true independence.

For the Albanian people now that independence is well and truly lost.

Tributes to Nexhmije – on the occasion of her death on 26th February 2020

Writings of Nexhmije Hoxha

Unfortunately there’s not a great deal published in England but what is available will be reproduced here.

Some fundamental questions of the Revolutionary Policy of the Party of Labour of Albania, 1977

More on Albania ……

More on the ‘Revolutionary Year’

View of the world

Ukraine – what you’re not told

To the Seventh Assault Brigade – Sqepur

Posted on by
Reply
Seventh Assault Brigade - Sqepur

Seventh Assault Brigade – Sqepur

More on Albania ……

View of the world

Ukraine – what you’re not told

To the Seventh Assault Brigade – Sqepur

Time hasn’t been too kind to the lapidar to the Seventh Assault Brigade which is situated beside the main road between Fier and Berat in an place called Sqepur. It’s at the top of a hill and is relatively exposed to the elements and this has taken it’s toll on the plaster work. There seem to have been attempts to paint, ‘renovate’, the images over the years but as this has not been done professionally this has made the images and some of the text more indistinct, filling in spaces and taking away the finer detail.

The lapidar consists of a tall monolith in the shape of the end of a rifle barrel with a flag attached and a panel at 90 degrees to this monolith showing scenes of battle.

The idea of using a rifle as the monolith is not unique, it has been used in Mushqeta and Priske, for example, but this one is slightly different in that attached to it is a stylised representation of a flag, here painted red. Due to the records being destroyed in the 1990s and those pictures of lapidars that were published in couple of books being principally in black and white there is some question if most of the lapidars were originally in colour. For good or ill many have been painted subsequently, probably even during the Socialist period so in that way distorting the aim and intention of the artist and sculptor.

The idea of attaching a flag to a rifle is again something that can be seen on other lapidars, but normally when the rifle is being used as a temporary pole and the flag being waved by a Partisan. This is the case with the female Partisan in the Fier Martyrs’ Cemetery.

The image of the wooden butt of the gun is seen here as it flares out from the vertical at the very bottom left hand corner of the monument, below the panel with the images of fighting.

Joining the rifle and the flag pole, just above the horizontal panel are two wide, concrete bands. On the upper the words

Forcat partizane të ish-qarkut të Beratit are attached in relief,

this translates as

Partisan forces of the former district of Berat

The town of Berat being located only about 15 kilometres to the south-east.

On the lower band, in exactly the same font and manner the words;

Forcat partizane të Brigadës VII Sulmuese appear

this translates as

Partisan Forces of the VII Assault Brigade

The National Liberation Army was made up of a number of such Brigades, guerrilla groups originally but developing into more formal structures as the war progressed, more and more fighters joined and the power of the Fascist invaders was broken. These Brigades were made up from people, men and women, who lived in the area although as the war developed they would sometimes move to other parts of the country to satisfy the military needs at any time.

The spacing of these letters looks a little strange, especially the lower slogan, but it’s not really possible to make out if anything else would be there to necessitate such spacing.

On the left hand side of the lower panel we have images from a battle. On the extreme left is a Partisan, in full uniform, firing a sub machine gun downwards. His right foot is placed in front of him and his left leg behind him to provide stability on uneven ground. This is a common device, used in many monuments of the time, such as the star at Pishkash and the bas relief in Bajram Curri, to tell the story that the War of Liberation was one that was fought, and won, in the mountains and that much of the early fighting especially would have been surprise ambushes from up on high.

It’s not possible to see if there’s a star on his cap but we can make out a scarf flying from his neck so we can have a reasonable assumption that he’s a Communist. One unusual feature is that he seems to be wearing a greatcoat, the bottom end of it seen between his outstretched legs. This is something that hasn’t appeared on other lapidars, to my knowledge. Unfortunately, the very end of the gun is missing, there being quite a lot of small areas of plaster that have disappeared over the years.

Behind him is a standing fighter but who is dressed in civilian clothes, his open jacket flapping in the breeze with his movement. Around his waist can be made out four ammunition pouches.

Photographs of guerrilla groups of the time show a mix of uniformed Partisans as well as those in everyday clothing. (Why do left wing guerrilla groups, from wherever in the world from the 1940s onwards, keep on taking pictures of themselves? It’s OK if you win but these pictures will cause untold problems if they get in the hands of the enemy. Two of the worst disasters that came as a result of this obsession with photographing themselves was the case of Che Guevara’s ‘foco’ group in Bolivia in 1968 and the videoing of an inebriated Abimael Guzman, the leader of the revolutionary Communist Party of Peru – Sendero Luminoso, in Peru in 1991.)

This Partisan is not facing the action but is looking back over his shoulder, his right arm raised, his fist clenched, encouraging other, unseen, comrades to come and join the fight. His left arm is hanging down and he holds a rifle close to the bolt mechanism. The upraised right hand passes outside the main panel and he has lost all the fingers.

The third member of this group is another uniformed Partisan. His right foot is firmly placed on the ground and he is kneeing with his left leg. We see him from his left side and his right hand can be seen just above his left shoulder. It looks like he has just taken out the pin of a Mills bomb grenade with his teeth and is about to throw it at the enemy below. In his left hand he holds the top of a bag, the weight of which is resting on the ground, which looks like it’s full of stick grenades, so he’s well prepared for action. There’s evidence of a scarf around his neck so we are, again, to assume that he is a Communist.

Any facial detail on all three is very difficult to make out. In fact, any fine detail at all is almost impossible to see. To bring this monument up to a condition that it had when first unveiled would take a lot of work and money, an amount nobody would be prepared to pay.

Behind these three Partisans are five stars of varying sizes. They are cut into the panel (the images of the Partisans are in relief) and have been painted red. There doesn’t seem to be any pattern to their arrangement and are presumably there to represent Communism but there actual arrangement means nothing more to me.

The centre of the panel is yet another conundrum. Originally here was a lot of text, in relief, on this part. It looks like it was painted out and then a separate plaque placed on top – possibly with the same text, possibly with something completely different. This must have existed for some time as that rectangle is black from the mould that was created in the moist atmosphere behind the plaque. Now the plaque has gone and it’s possible to see some letters that were covered as well as those outside the area but it’s very difficult to make out the sense of what is there. It will need a good Albanian speaker (which, unfortunately, I’m not) to spend some time to unravel this puzzle. It is obviously something important as this text is in the central position on the monument.

The right hand side of the panel has a number of very strange, unusual and confusing elements. Basically what we have is the figure of an officer, we get that impression by the very nature of his uniform. (The National Liberation Army had a ‘traditional’ officer structure but after the success of the Albanian revolution that hierarchical structure was abandoned and the focus became much more on a people based militia rather than one based on ranks and superiority.)

Seventh Assault Brigade Officer - Sqepur

Seventh Assault Brigade Officer – Sqepur

But all the proportions are wrong. His head is far too big for his body. When I first saw this lapidar I thought the artists had created a cartoon figure rather than a serious representation of a Partisan fighter, prepared to give his life for the freedom of his country. Having looked at it a number of times I’m also reminded of Stan Laurel.

His stance is also unusual. As part of his officers uniform he has straps that criss-cross his chest and around his waist there are ammunition pouches attached to his belt. Here we have him with the thumb of his left hand tucked behind these pouches in a very nonchalant manner. His right arm is hanging down but it’s not possible to work out what he might have had in that hand as this is another area where decay has had an impact on the image. There’s also some damage to the shin of his right leg. And the look on his face is a little bit weird. All in all not what you expect from an officer when there’s a battle raging close by.

It also looks as if the original design included a star which was to be behind this officer. The top point is above the rectangle of the panel, to the left of this officers head, but then the rest of the star just seems to disappear. It might be wear and tear but I can’t really work out why this star was placed where it was. It just doesn’t make much sense.

Apart from the neglect that the lapidar has undergone the whole area surrounding it is uncared for and dirty. The grass hasn’t been cut for years and the general area has an accumulation of rubbish and the ubiquitous flimsy plastic bags abound. The only living creature happy there (apart from me) on my visit was the stray dog taking shelter from the sun.

There is no known further information about the date of inauguration or the name of the artist.

Location

At a bend in the road, at the top of a rise just after passing the village of Sqepur when travelling from Fier.

GPS

N40.791619

E19.818821

DMS

40° 47′ 29.8284” N

19° 49′ 7.7556” E

Altitude

122.2 m

More on Albania ……

View of the world

Ukraine – what you’re not told

Will the vaccines stop the pandemic – or will we go to war over their supply?

Posted on by
Reply

More on covid pandemic 2020-2?

View of the world

Ukraine – what you’re not told

Will the vaccines stop the pandemic – or will we go to war over their supply?

Sceptic as I am, and despising the present Government in the UK as I do, I have to admit that I’ve been (pleasantly) surprised at the ‘success’ of the vaccination programme. There were a few blips at the start but, in general, matters seemed – and continue – to go smoothly.

The spat with the European Union (EU) over supply was the modern day, State equivalent, of a spoilt child taking their ball away when the decision went against them. That seems to have calmed down a bit at the moment – the only remaining issue being the childish manner in which officials in the EU are clinging on to their (it must be said, very lucrative) jobs.

At the same time there are aspects of the vaccine acquisition that need to be considered. The ‘success’ of the vaccines – nearly all of them so far – wasn’t down to some long term programme that was getting close to an effective result. It was very much based on luck. A combination of factors came together which meant that the covid virus was vulnerable to those elements that scientists had been developing for years. Perhaps luck is the wrong word but the virus arrived at just the right time when work of the past was able to more effectively deal with it.

However, when it comes to the British Government their success rests solely upon a gamble. With public money – so none of them were out of pocket – they bought millions of doses of virtually all the vaccines that were in development in the middle of last year. Long before many other governments did so. There was no guarantee that any of these vaccines would work. The fact that they do is ‘good’ for the Buffoon and his Government, but it doesn’t detract from the fact that it was definitely by luck and not design that the vaccines are being put into the arms of the British population at this time.

But then if you bet on every horse in a race you will back the winner – but whether you have ‘won’ financially is another matter. Some might say that it was worth the gamble, and they might be right. But as these new variants come along and doubts start to be spread about the vaccines efficacy in combatting them that situation could change.

And even if some countries are doing well when it comes to their vaccination programmes (and the big hitters at the moment seem to be Britain and Israel – whilst still denying the same treatment to the Palestinians, whose country they occupy, as they do to their own population) the question of what happens about the majority of the people in the world without the finance and clout of those two countries is still in question.

Every government and politician accepts that to end the pandemic it needs to be fought on a worldwide scale but few, if any, are actually doing anything about it. As the figures of those vaccinated start to be counted in their millions in Britain they are being counted in their tens in much of the world.

100,000 and counting

The Buffoon is hoping that the relative success in the speed of the vaccination programme will make people forget about what has (or hasn’t happened) in the last year or so. So to keep the issue live;

Why the 100,000 toll is so bad.

And if we are ‘to follow the science’;

‘Poor decisions’ to blame for UK death toll, scientists say.

The ugly spat between the EU and Big Pharma

At the time of writing this issue has been ‘resolved’ – although there does seem to be a bit of ‘passing the buck’ still going on in the EU hierarchy – we live in a political culture of not taking responsibility. It wasn’t a surprise that there would be conflict once vaccines were developed, perhaps what is slightly surprising was the undignified manner in which it developed (or perhaps not).

Perhaps one of the more disturbing elements of this spat was that it made Arlene Foster, the First Minister of Northern Ireland, sound reasonable.

The story so far;

AstraZeneca defends EU vaccine roll out plan.

EU demands UK-made AstraZeneca vaccine doses.

But the Buffoon is there to calm the nation’s fears.

Was there even an issue at all? If so, what’s being done to speed up production?

EU confirms new vaccine export controls

then

Bloc backtracks on controls for Northern Ireland.

All in a matter of a couple of days. And making it a field day for the xenophobes and racists.

Preparing for the next pandemic

It’s coming (that’s if we can get rid of the present one)! It’s a matter of when, not if. But unless lessons are learnt from covid then the cosequences in the future will be much more dire – with less slack in the system to come up with sticking plaster solutions.

So some ideas that are starting to be presented.

Make hardware ‘open source’ can help us fight future pandemics.

The problem here – and probably for all such recommendations to deal with a future pandemic is that we live in a capitalist controlled society. ALL the measures that might be suggested that would have a real effect will go against the ideas of ‘liberal economics’ and the capitalist concept of ‘freedom’ – freedom to exploit workers and the situation, freedom to maximise profits. There’s a conflict from the start.

Vaccination Programme

Now that (in Britain) the vast majority of the ‘most vulnerable’ have been offered the vaccine it’s now open season for intetrest groups to say who should be next. (Not a judgement, just a statement of fact.)

Charity calls for homeless people to be given vaccine priority.

Older age groups in UK ‘will die’ if Covid vaccine priority goes to younger key workers.

The climate of fear

If you create a climate of fear don’t be surprised when people are fearful. UK Covid patients are dying needlessly due to unfounded fears about ventilators. (But this then gives the Government someone to blame – other than themselves – for some of the deaths.)

How the figures are used sometimes obscures the truth

On 27th January Radio 4’s More or less discussed how the figures of reported deaths are often used for shock effect by various sections of the media – and politicians.

International vaccination programmes

Israel’s vaccine roll out has been fast, so why is it controversial and what can other countries learn?

This was going to be an issue from Day 1. If a vaccine was the ‘solution’ the rich were going to get it first – despite any logic to the contrary. Welcome to the next mass extinction.

WHO (World Health Organisation) urges Britain to pause covid jabs after treating vulnerable.

This is a strange one and part of the legacy of racism. Vaccine scepticism lurks in town famous for syphilis study. And there will be many places and countries around the world where such scepticism will be encountered – as a result of imperialist interventions over centuries. Another example of ‘chickens coming home to roost’.

‘Collateral damage’

NHS will take months to return to normal in England.

Covid could cost children £350 billion in earnings due to lost learning. Read the full observation from the Institute for Fiscal Studies: The crisis in lost learning calls for a massive national policy response

Ministers accused of failure to help most deprived as covid infections fall far slower in poorest areas

Covid ‘variants’

‘Variants’ is becoming the buzz word now. South African scientists who discovered new covid-19 variant share what they know.

Is the evolution of the virus a good or a bad thing? Will coronavirus really evolve to become less deadly?

This could just as well as gone under the ‘climate of fear’ heading as such speculation certainly doesn’t help to create calm. And if the Government is concerned about eventual vaccine take-up then having someone, a so-called ‘expert’, passing aspersions on the efficacy of the present vaccines that’s not going to help. It seems that there are more people than ever after their ’15 minutes of fame’ – whatever damage that short period in the limelight might cause. Warning UK could become covid ‘melting pot’ as new mutations detected. And even if this were the case then with a population of a mere 60 million out of a world population of 8 billion then there must be other factors at work – those which can be managed – to cause this tiny island at the edge of Europe to be such a menace to the rest of the world.

Nightingale hospitals

This is an item that could well be included in the ‘preparations for the next pandemic’. These are the practical matters that have to be sorted out as soon as possible. If not the ‘Nightingale Hospitals’ then what? Something has to replace them (perhaps the concept of ‘fever hospitals’) – for long term defence capabilities of the next pandemic. It needs a radical change of thinking and the development of a clear strategy – but that may be more wishful thinking that bearing any relationship to reality.

Doctors question if London Nightingale hospital was best way to treat covid.

‘ … it [the London Nightingale Hospital] only ever treated 54 patients, was hamstrung by hospitals’ reluctance to release doctors and nurses to work there and was derided by some in the NHS as a costly gimmick.’

Infection and its consequences

Risk of severe covid established early in infection.

Testing

Testing has continued to take a back seat to the vaccination programme but if nothing is learnt from the last year and a truly viable, functioning and effective test, track and trace system cannot be established which will be able to come into full programme within a matter of days of a pandemic being identified then there will be no hope of avoiding another disaster similar to that of the last year – and this and the next?

One important aspect of effective testing is it being based locally. The situation forced on the country with the new variant might well be able to point the way forward and also show the difficulties – as well as the advantages – of the country adopting such a scheme.

South African variant of covid found in eight areas of England – door-to-door testing launched.

The rich during a pandemic

We’ll have to see how this develops – it shouldn’t be a surprise if it is just left to fall out of the news. Canadian couple who got vaccine meant for Indigenous people. They ‘might’ face gaol. We shall see.

George Osborne to join Robey Warshaw (a company involved in some of the biggest business takeovers) – and will get a lot of money for doing so.

Experiences of the pandemic

Remember people being bussed from London to Arrowe Park Hospital in Liverpool? In hindsight it wasn’t necessarily a good experience. ‘I wish I’d stayed in Wuhan and missed flight’.

More on covid pandemic 2020-2?

View of the world

Ukraine – what you’re not told