In November 2012, the Awami Party, Labour Party and Workers Party merged to form the Awami Workers Party (AWP) in an unprecedented effort to build a genuine Left alternative to mainstream political forces in Pakistan. The party’s programme was designed to bring together the disparate struggles of workers, peasants, students, women and ethnic and religious minorities in Pakistan under the banner of a genuinely democratic and socialist politics.

The party held its First Congress on Sept 27-28, which consolidated the first phase of party-building, with the election of its national leadership following sub-national party elections around the country. AWP continues to work towards becoming a genuine progressive and socialist political alternative to the material and ideological status-quo in Pakistan that is equipped to deal with the challenges posed by the forces of capital, imperialism and reaction in the contemporary era.

This merger reflects recognition within leftist circles, both of the growing contradictions ­within the prevailing structure of power and the need for unity and maturity so as to take advantage of these contradictions.

Party Program

• The State will take the primary responsibility of organizing and planning the country’s economy.
• Major industries, including those run by the military, will be nationalized and placed under the control of a democratic state.
• The party will resist imperialist aggression against our people in all its manifestations: be they drone strikes, multinational capital or austerity measures imposed by the IMF and World Bank.
• The Privatization policy will be immediately stopped, all privatized industries will be re-nationalized and sacked employees will be re-instated.
• The democratic right of workers to form trade unions will be recognized and protected as part of the state’s policy of democratizing the work place and improving working conditions.
• Radical land reforms will be immediately implemented and land will be redistributed among the peasantry in order to break the political and social power of big land owning families.
• Will fundamentally change the state’s hostile policy towards neighbouring countries, which has been used to justify the military establishment’s economic and political power.
• The party recognizes that the question of women liberation has received inadequate attention, even within Leftist circles. The party aims to fight against all forms of discrimination against women and considers women a vanguard of the revolution, without whom any fundamental change is impossible.
• The hollow ideology of religious fanaticism will be fully exposed and popular opinion will be mobilized to fight against such retrograde forces.
• Pakistan’s multinational essence will be recognized and a genuine federal system based on the right of self-determination for all nations will be established.
• The existing, oppressive state institutions will be replaced with those that provide for basic needs and are fundamentally democratic in their functions.

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