Democracy

May Day is a historically significant day for our class: without unions we would not have any rights on the job. These are under attack today and on May Day we were there to defend our penalty rates, our unions' right to organise against Turnbull's new construction police (ABCC), against racism and for peace, justice and for an ecologically sustainable future.

As a First Nations activist I’ll be joining the harbour blockade on May 8. Newcastle’s beautiful harbour is a fitting place to take a stand against coal exports and environmental destruction. People hunger for a different world based on cooperation and treating the land with respect, values at the heart of all First Nations cultures. The violation of these values is illustrated by the failure of Hunter-based coal companies to sign land use agreements with the traditional owners. As a First Nations activist I'll be joining the harbour blockade on May 8.

Senator Glenn Lazarus’s 117-page interim Senate report on unconventional gas mining in Australia was released on May 4. It makes a case for much tighter federal control of the industry and the public resources it has access to, but does not recommend its closure. If anything the report underscores the need for a royal commission into the toxic industry that relies on commercial in confidence provisions to get away with poisoning people and the environment.

Trade unionists and activists from the Save Medicare Campaign held a snap lunchtime rally in Sydney on May 5, which featured a "Race To Save Medicare". Three patients were in the race while a dark-suited Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull tried to disrupt the race and steal their Medicare cards. They highlighted the charges patients will be hit with for various medical tests from July this year under a Coalition government.

Proving that US voters are still energenised to go to the polls to voice their support for "political revolution", self-described socialist Senator Bernie Sanders won the Democrats Indiana primary on May 3 -- besting rival Hillary Clinton and notching a much-needed victory as the corporate media and political class continues to discount his chances and downplay the accomplishments of the campaign.

Venezuela's right-wing opposition coalition, the Roundtable of Democratic Unity (MUD), has officially launched its signature collection campaign to force a recall referendum this year against socialist President Nicolas Maduro.  Thousands of opposition supporters flocked to sign the petition in public squares across the country on April 27 after MUD spokespeople confirmed they had received the official go-ahead from Venezuela's National Electoral Council (CNE). 

It has taken only nine months for the third memorandum between the near-bankrupt Greek state and its creditors — the “Quartet” of the European Union (EU), European Central Bank (ECB), International Monetary Fund (IMF) and European Stability Mechanism (ESM) — to lurch to the brink of crisis. That deal, which the Syriza-led government of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras felt forced to swallow despite the Greek people rejecting an earlier version by over 60% in a referendum last July, will provide the country with €86 billion. About 90% of this will go to paying off debt.

Suspected Islamist militants hacked to death a leading gay rights activist and a friend in an apartment in the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka, on April 25, TeleSUR English reported that day. The killings came just two days after a university professor was murdered in similar fashion in an attack claimed by ISIS.

The divisions in the Republican Party over Donald Trump's candidacy in Republican primaries have been the subject of much commentary — and it remains to be seen how this will play out. We may not know until the Republican convention. But the divisions in the Democratic Party due to the Bernie Sanders' candidacy in Democrat primaries are coming more and more to the fore — including in the capitalist press.

Turkish forces destroying homes in the Kurdish city of Nusaybin. The Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) has published a report on the war crimes, human rights violations and deaths in Kurdish towns and cities since July last year, with a special focus on Cizre, Kurdish Question said on April 22.

Brazilian workers were planning May Day rallies ahead of May 1 to defend democracy against what is being cast as an attempted parliamentary coup against President Dilma Rousseff. The move came as representatives from both sides of Brazil’s political divide made their case for or against impeachment on April 28. A special Senate committee has been charged with reviewing the request to see the president removed from office. It will hear presentations from experts invited by both sides of the impeachment debate.

British politics is being dominated by the June 23 referendum on whether Britain leaves the European Union (EU) — the so-called Brexit. This is a question that has, over recent decades, threatened to fatally divide the British right. But left forces also hold contradictory perspectives on the question. Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, the Green Party of England and Wales and Left Unity are calling for a “yes” vote to remain in the European Union, but are demanding an alternative to the neoliberal EU.