WNP Threat

[Ernestocheguevara]

As you may know I am an SP member, but if there is anything that should pull the left together it's what has been happening to myself and other comrades at our Lincoln Branch.

Three weeks ago one of our members was punched in the face whilst on our paper stall in the middle of town by who we thought at the time was a BNP member, the week after was our annual congress meeting (so we did not do a stall) and the week after that some other comrades joined us from elsewhere in the region to up the numbers.

This week (today) we had five on our stall and were once again hassled by what we now know are WNP members (there site can be found here, www.wnpuk.org) there manifesto reads like hitlers diary!!, there was intially just one guy but when he had a go and saw what sort of numbers we had he got on the phone and called in another five guys who threw serious threats about and kicked the stall in, telling us we weren't welcome!! Thankfully no one was hurt and as the Lincon Vs Hull game was on there was plenty of old bill about, we also had the added advantage of positioning ourselves directly in front of a CCTV camera, but we are now concerned about this serious threat of an extreme right wing party who claim to be more extreme then the BNP, infact the BNP have condemned them, how much of that you believe is up to you, if we do not unite on the left these idiots are gonna get in then who knows what may happen!!

Any ideas???

[BOZG]

A comrade of ours in Coleraine has had constant harassment from the WNP in the past few months. While he's in Belfast now, he was originally doing stalls on his own in Coleraine and was threatened by one of the loyalist paramilitaries and WNP members that he would be kneecapped if he didn't stop. In the past couple of months he's also been receiving death threats over his phone from the WNP.

Past experiences have shown us the ability of the working class, trade unions and left-wing parties to build a real opposition to Nazism with the 50,000 strong march that shutdown the Welling HQ of the BNP in the early 90s. Some of this was possible because of the organising capabilities of the BNP itself and because of its attempts to make itself a credible party. The problem with the WNP is that it is not a political party as such and its unlike that it would really advertise where its branches are located etc. and a similar demonstration like that in Welling cannot be organised. I think the only real course of action (short of backing off) is to just maintain a presence but to try and flood the stall with as many comrades as possible as a security measure (while raising the issue of the WNP harassment with the left and unions in the area). Another suggestion would be that if possible, maybe yourselves and other left group (if there's one locally) would do your stalls in relative proximity to enlargen the numbers. You could also raise the issue of Nazism, the WNP and their harassment as an issue on the stall to make people aware of what's happening. If the feeling is quite strong against it, it could possibly make the WNP think twice.