6. THE POLITICAL SITUATION IN GREECE AND THE MACEDONIAN NATIONAL QUESTION DURI

6. THE POLITICAL SITUATION IN GREECE AND THE MACEDONIAN NATIONAL QUESTION DURING THE SECOND WORLD WAR

After the failed coup attempt in March 1935, some improvements were made to the centre-right political orientation in Greece, but they were only temporary. These improvements were made in part because of the devastating defeat the Liberal Party suffered under the coup attempt. The Tsaldaris government was strengthened thanks to the open support it received from the Greek political right led by D. Kondilis and Ioanis Metaxas. The new political situation also opened the door for King Georgios II to return to Greece and, with the plebiscite conducted on November 3, 1935, establish his monarchy. Greece was proclaimed a republic in 1924. But the defeat the liberals suffered in March 1935 did not weaken them to the extent that the People’s Party and the Greek right were hoping. The parliamentary elections in January 1936 confirmed that. Political debates between the Liberal and the People’s Party, as well as the noisy propaganda carried out during the elections, did not influence the voter to vote in favour of one or another of the main ruling parties. But, despite its defeat in 1935, the Liberal Party received 574,655 votes and sent 142 MPs to the new Greek parliament in 1936. The conservative formations that gathered around the People’s Party during the 1936 elections also received their desired majority. They received 602,840 votes and sent 143 MPs to the new Greek parliament. The Popular Front, which united the left-wing forces, headed by the CPG, achieved some results. The Popular Front received 73,411 votes with 15 MPs ready to serve in the new Greek

Parliament. Unfortunately neither of the major parties had an absolute majority and was able to form a stable government.

This, however, was a great opportunity for the Popular Front which, with its 15 members, held the balance of power. If before 1936 the Greek bourgeois parties refused to allow any CPG compromises in regards to the CPG’s policy for a united and independent Macedonia, after the elections both the Liberal and the People’s Party took the first step to settling this issue. But, despite the CPG’s leverage, they still insisted that if any talks were to take place, the CPG had to reject and replace its current policy for a united and independent Macedonia. Popular Front representatives, headed by M. Porfirogenis, “dressed in tailcoats”, addressed King George II and informed him that “the CPG was not asking for Macedonian autonomy”. (Polihroni K. Enerediki, i eliniki andistasis, 1941-1944, Athina, 1964, p. 83.) The Greek bourgeois parties established contact with the CPG, in context of this historical Macedonian National Question policy, without fearing that they would be attacked by their political opponents “for cooperating with the Party that sold out Greek national interests”. Contact between the People’s Party and the Left was made by K. Angielopoulos, representing the People’s Party, and D. Glinos, G. Siantos, and M. Porfirogenis representing the Left. At the same time representatives from the Liberal Party established contacts with S. Sklavenas representing the Popular Front. At the end an agreement was signed between T. Sofoulis, representing the Liberal Party, and S. Sklavenas, representing the Popular Front. According to the agreement, the Popular Front demanded full freedom, general political amnesty, dissolution of the fascist formations, introduction of a proportional election system, reduction of the price of bread, etc. But despite the fact that this Sofoulis-Sklavenas Agreement did not offer any protection to the Macedonian people, it was strongly attacked by the political Right which refused to recognize the CPG’s political legitimacy, and accused it of attempting to enter into the political consciousness of the masses and of creating a disgruntled population, as a historical precedent, and only in its favour. The only thing the CPG did for the Macedonian people, however, was that it made one statement. It was during a parliamentary debate on Metaxas’s program when S. Sklavenas stated that “in order for the government to have pretensions on the Macedonian minority and

ask it to spill its blood on the northern borders, it will be necessary to guarantee some of its rights like use of its mother tongue, customs, etc.”

The Soufulis-Sklavenas Agreement was signed during a time when Greek society was experiencing strong economic and political instability. Mass economic and political dissatisfaction was expressed during the massive demonstrations in Solun. This dissatisfaction began with massive demonstrations in Kukush, Seres, Drama and Western Thrace and, on May 8, 1936, culminated with mass demonstrations in Solun during which about 15,000 tobacco workers participated. They were brutally suppressed which caused even greater demonstrations. About 150,000 demonstrators took part at the protest rally in Freedom Square in Solun to protest the May 8, 1936 bloody Solun suppression. After bloody clashes with the police, the working people of Solun and surrounding areas took over the city for almost 36 hours. This demonstration was also brutally and irresponsibly crushed by the police, during which 10 demonstrators were killed. After this, rallies and demonstrations took place all throughout Greece, which actively demonstrated solidarity and support for the workers who demonstrated in Solun. While the demonstrations were going on, Popular Front representatives in the Greek parliament demanded General Metaxas’s immediate resignation. He was blamed for being the main culprit responsible for the bloody events in Solun. On July 24, 1936, the two largest Greek trade union organizations, the Confederation of Greek Workers and the United General Workers’ Conference, decided to organize an all Greek general strike in protest against repressive government policies and the political Right’s attempts to crush Greek political life.

The political instability that swept throughout the country began to seriously worry the Greek bourgeoisie, who saw an end to this only through the introduction of a dictatorial regime. This historical moment, naturally, was exploited by General Ioanis Metaxas whose dictatorial affinities were known long before that moment and, with benevolent support from the Greek Royal Court, the dictatorship was a done deal. The path to this personal dictatorial introduction was facilitated by the disappearance of E. Venizelos and his first Minister D. K. Demerdzhis from the political celebrity scene. These

two famous political figures lost their lives in order for Metaxas to come to power, especially Demerdzhis who was seen as “God’s gift”. With the approval of the king, the political vacuum was filled by the old and ambitious General Metaxas.

Political repressions against the left-wing forces, particularly against the CPG and EOKDE (United Organization of the Communist Internationalists in Greece), began in the evening of August 4, 1936, the same day the dictatorship took power. About 2,000 Communists and their sympathizers were arrested and sent to jail in the camps of Akronavplion, Aegina and Kerkira.

The Metaxas dictatorship demonstrated severe cruelty against the Macedonian people which, for them, was a dictatorship with a fascist character. Metaxas not only banished and outlawed every public manifestation of Macedonian national feeling, including Macedonian expressions demonstrated through language, traditions and customs, but also severely punished those who broke the law. In this regard Metaxas outdid in cruelty even the Italian fascists who spat in the mouths of the spiteful Slovenes who dared to speak Slovenian in their presence. Because of this profound national oppression, both Macedonians and Slovenes massively joined their common struggle for national freedom and Human dignity during the National Liberation War. In parallel with the persecution of the Macedonian people for being Macedonian and speaking Macedonian, Metaxas had aims to disable all political and national activities, especially those led by the Macedonian communists and by the MRO (United). At the time MRO (United) in Greek occupied Macedonia was led by A. Chipov, K. Galbov, L. Trpovski and T. Hadzhiianov who were all sent to the prison camps by the dictatorial regime.

But resistance against the dictatorship did not end, in fact it continued even in the prison camps. Both Macedonian and Greek communists turned the prison camps into real universities where Marxist theory was deeply studied. In addition to political resistance, the Macedonian people continued to express their national being, using the Macedonian language in secret, even inside the camps of the dictatorial regime. This was a rare historical

glimpse of how the Macedonian people had survived under duress over the ages…