THE 10th PLENUM — A PROGRAM FOR ACTION * Yesterday, after reading the communiqué on the meeting of the 10th Plenum of the Party’s Central Committee, communists and workers throughout our country eagerly read Comrade Ramiz Alia’s speech to the Plenum, published in the press. The tasks set out in this programmatic speech enrich our Party’s experience in successfully tackling the pressing problems arising from the country’s socialist construction and the improvement of the people’s well-being. They give concrete form to the Party’s guidelines for deepening socialist democracy and further improving relations in production, in keeping with the interests of the people and developments in international life. Reading Comrade Ramiz’s speech to the 10th Plenum is prompting lively discussions and debates in every collective, giving further impetus to the work and helping implement the tasks in every sector of life and production. Yesterday our editors and correspondents met with workers and cooperative members, managers, specialists in various fields, and others, and gathered the following interviews:

The tasks set out by the 10th Plenum of the Party’s Central Committee and by Comrade Ramiz Alia in his speech are a necessity and a demand of the times: to raise economic management methods to a higher level and strengthen the influence, guidance and practical application of economic reasoning and the economic mechanism. Enterprises and agricultural cooperatives, as the basic cells of the economy, are at the heart of strengthening the ideas and actions of the driving forces of our society in efforts to develop the mass line and improve the economic mechanism. Under present conditions, they put into practice Comrade Enver Hoxha’s valuable teachings on these major issues. The measures adopted by the 10th Plenum broaden the concept of enterprise self-accounting, and strengthen the role and key position enterprises occupy in our economic system, in expanded reproduction and in their activities. Within this framework, their economic management through self-accounting cannot be merely a method of management based on plans and accounts: with the revenues earned through production, they must cover reproduction costs and secure a surplus of income for themselves and for society. The improved economic mechanism expands the enterprise’s economic and financial autonomy within the framework of the principle of democratic centralism and the unified general state plan. The adopted measures are not simply changes in terminology, indicators and powers; they establish and apply relationships in such important areas as production, distribution, exports, employment and wages, investment, prices, and so on. The aim is to further increase enterprise initiative and action. The role and initiative of the enterprise are considerably increased. Its individual and collective responsibility also grows, through the application of the criterion of workers’ participation in the use of the enterprise’s net income or of the (Continued on page 2)

— SHKODËR — The 10th Plenum of the Party’s Central Committee left it to cooperative members to decide for themselves how they wanted to organize the supply arrangements: through livestock groups collectively or individually. This is a democratic approach, allowing them to choose the most effective ways of further improving supplies for cooperative members. So yesterday morning, as soon as people had read the Plenum’s communiqué and Comrade Ramiz Alia’s speech in the press, the leading officials of the authorities and the rural economy held a plenum, while activists and brigade leaders got to work. In some places, activists’ meetings were held; elsewhere, the cooperative presidiums and people’s councils met; in still other places, the brigades and sectors gathered. In Vrakë, cooperative chairman Gjete Gjoni says that proposals have been made to divide the livestock in the groups among families... “We will organize meetings to put this matter to the people, in the brigades and villages.” Veteran Mile Velo adds: “In any case, supplying things this way is more effective and economical, especially when it comes to those things that we in the village can ... (Continued on page 2)

Alongside other measures for the further democratization of the country’s economic and social life, the regular 10th Plenum of the Party’s Central Committee examined and approved measures to improve legislation, which the Government will submit for consideration to the next session of the People’s Assembly. Our country has advanced, modern legislation that reflects the great transformations that have taken place here in every sphere of life. But this legislation cannot stand still; it must necessarily adapt to society’s continuing development. This is all the more essential and timely in a system with great developmental dynamism, such as socialism. The changes being made now and those that will be made in the future respond to the need to deepen democracy and further democratize social relations. At the present stage of development of Albanian society, the rise in citizens’ educational and cultural level, their genuine spiritual emancipation—first and foremost that of women—and the greater responsibility workers themselves have to decide on all the problems they encounter collectively and, in words, cannot but have a powerful impact on improving legislation in an ever more democratic direction. Our legislation must reflect the process through which people’s personalities develop in our country and keep pace with this development, with care for protecting citizens’ rights against every form of bureaucratic suppression and distortion at its heart. The measures outlined by the 9th Plenum and approved by the 10th Plenum, both in the field of criminal justice and in other fields, are permeated throughout by this concern for affirming citizens’ rights. They will undoubtedly give a significant new impetus to the further democratization of our socialist society, because socialism cannot be understood without democracy, without this essential and inalienable feature of it. Prof. LUAN OMARI

Since January 1 of this year, the “Enver” plant has been operating under separate self-accounting, having been detached from the automotive-tractor combine. Although only a few months have passed, the changes are already being felt in increased production. Reading Comrade Ramiz Alia’s speech to the 10th Plenum, we feel how many advantages are being given to us through the increased powers of enterprises, but we also see how many opportunities the deepening of self-accounting management opens up for us. The administrations certainly have more work, and more skilled work. Securing self-financing from our own resources requires an increase in the enterprise’s net income and more creative thinking in this area. But how much work does this create for specialists, economists, technologists and others in reducing costs? At our plant, for example, major overhauls used to be carried out by workers on the basic wage. This year we have introduced piece-rate norms for this work, encouraging workers’ interest. Do you know what the first quarter brought us? Workers received wages averaging 7 percent higher than before, while repairs amounted to nearly half of all the work done in 1989. This year, overhaul work has been planned at around 60 percent more, while also saving funds. Now that we are a separate enterprise, all the semifinished products that the plant used to receive from the automotive-tractor combine now come to us at higher prices. The combine has to generate its own accumulation. But self-accounting management has put us in a “bind” once again. We have to find ways to reduce costs. We can apply a certain amount of “pressure” on the combine over prices, but we should also look at internal solutions: reorganizing work so that we produce the semifinished products ourselves at lower cost. Of course, self-accounting management will require high production efficiency in a field that is no less demanding for specialists. It is true that we will be allocated the wage fund, but how (Photo: N. Xhufka)

The speech by comrade Ramiz raises very important issues of foreign policy. Among other things, it discusses a tradition of our National Movement: the commitment of the statesmen of our nation, who at various stages of history fought with weapons in hand to defend the rights of the Albanian people, but who also did not neglect diplomatic means. Despite many obstacles and difficulties, they made Albania’s voice heard by the broad international public and in the institutions where European policy was shaped. This was an integral part of the effort to liberate Albania from foreign rule, as well as to advance the country along the path of independent and democratic development. In today’s circumstances, this tradition, in addition to its indisputable historical value, has an especially acute relevance. It represents valuable experience that can serve not only as a source of inspiration, but also as a national school to guide our state’s activity in the international arena. Our diplomacy is undoubtedly oriented toward the present and the future. Nevertheless, it has much to learn from the past in order to meet successfully the major tasks ahead in defending state interests and, more broadly, national interests. The general idea running through that part of comrade Ramiz’s speech which deals with foreign-policy issues is precisely the urgent need, in the current situation, for our state to participate more broadly and actively in foreign relations. Great state and national interests are at stake, and they can be defended only through an active foreign policy. The malicious distortions spread by a certain foreign propaganda—which has tried to portray our country as closed, supposedly impervious to every friendly overture from the outside world—are disproved. The 10th Plenum reaffirmed what was stated at the 9th Plenum: socialist Albania is ready to respond with friendship to anyone who offers it friendship. The positions set out in comrade Ramiz’s speech considerably broaden the range of issues. They call for a major mobilization and realignment, as well as a new style of work. The conclusion is clear: the 10th Plenum sets the task of making our diplomacy active, initiative-taking, effective, and receptive in every area of foreign policy where solutions affecting the interests and rights of Albania and Albanians in general can be worked out.

— Among the frontrunners in the Samanda department is the collective of the ushibimore enterprise, which is working this period toward the targets for May. Production targets have been exceeded, especially for the various processed products made for domestic processing and for export, as well as for the domestic market. Working at a fast pace, while ensuring compliance with technical and technological parameters, the collective has achieved quality indicators and reduced material-use rates by 1.5 percent, saving materials compared with the previous year and making the planned effort for this period once again. The targets for generating around 970 thousand lek have been met, and financial revenues have also been achieved in line with the objectives. Recently ... This has made it possible to achieve the fulfillment of the new production ...

We stopped by the family of Xhemal Ago. Lirla, Xhemal’s son’s wife, who is also chairwoman of the united village council in Mollas, Elbasan, urged us to come and have lunch at her home. And we did not refuse. At this house we also met Xhemal Ago, Lirë’s father-in-law, a farmer of about 80. He sat at the head of the table. He is a wise, very composed farmer, the kind of person who could win anyone over. It is precisely his wisdom and patriotism that we are making the subject of this article, which we are now beginning. “Do you know whose home we are eating at today?” Sefer Xibraku, the cooperative’s Party bureau secretary, a kindly man, said, addressing us. “We are eating at Xhemal Ago’s, in the family that was the poorest in all of Mollas before the Liberation.” “When we say ‘the poorest,’ we mean it absolutely,” added Sami Asllani, the cooperative chairman. “He was the poorest. In this beautiful house, he once had a shack. Isn’t that right, Uncle Xhemal?” Xhemal had lowered his head. “That’s right! I built ten shacks with these own hands before the Liberation.” At that point Uncle Xhemal said: “Let’s leave that aside, Sefer! It’s not that we’ve forgotten, but if I start telling those stories, I’m afraid I’ll be the only one talking today and you’ll be listening. Today, though, I want to hear from our guests. We villagers are very happy when guests come to see us.” (Continued on page 2)

Photo: N. Xhufka

The struggle of our people and our Party has aimed, and continues to aim, at building a free and just society, where there are no exploiters and exploited, where everyone is valued and rewarded according to the work they do and the role they play in society’s progress, and where people’s material and spiritual lives are enriched day by day. RAMIZ ALIA

With yesterday’s newspaper in hand, we found workers and specialists at the nickel-cobalt plant in the “Çeliku i Partisë” metallurgical combine discussing Comrade Ramiz’s speech to the 10th Plenum of the Central Committee. “These instructions and tasks are for us to carry out through our daily work and activity,” begins the conversation Mehmet Goxhaj, a worker in the electrolysis department. “Among other things, Comrade Ramiz emphasizes: ‘Now the workers themselves have a greater interest in observing order and discipline, because everyone’s earnings depend on the work we do together.’ We see and feel this at our plant too. (Continued on page 2)