According to the RAE, the comrade is the person who helps another and eats and lives with him, although when we talk about "certain parties and unions" it means "coreligionary or member". Personally, he did not know that the term was of military origin or that it came from the Spanish-language chamber, so that camaraderie or affinity in origin would be "a close friendship between soldiers and officers who lived under the same chamber". “Every day you learn something new,” our mother said.

However, it was the Bolshevik that spread the comrade as an egalitarian alternative to the term "lord", and gradually, throughout the twentieth century, it spread among all those who wanted to make revolution and change the world. Comrade, Tovarich.

Today there are other terms to name their fighting members. Galeano tells in his magnificent Book of Hugs that in Cuba, for example, the friend is called “my land” or “my blood”, and in Caracas, “the friend is my frog or key: the frog, by bakery, a source of good bread for hungry souls; and the key... The key for the key – says Mario Benedetti –. He says that when he lived in Buenos Aires, in the time of terror, he had five keys locked: five keys, five houses, five people: the keys that were saved.”

To me, like many others on the Abertzale Left, I was left with the keys of several houses to try to save my skin. It was a time of panic when police raids were happening every week, and if you weren't, when your neighbor, your partner, was your partner. It served me little because at last they stopped me, but it is one of the treasures I will keep forever. Faced with the monster we had in front of us, it was a pure spirit of camaraderie, an enemy that dominated in terms of force and strength, but not in terms of cunning, solidarity and camaraderie.

All of this I say is what is happening with the congress that Sortu is going to hold soon. Members, comrades, sortu base militants, LAB, ERNAI and popular movement have come together to present an alternative report for the discontent they have had with the political praxis developed by sortu (not EH Bildu) in the last five years. The name given to Earth is Lotuz.

I believe that they have done so at the appropriate time, at the congressional stage, and although it is not customary in the Abertzale Left, I believe that they have full legitimacy for this (among other things, this is recognized by the Rules of Procedure itself).

Unfortunately, instead of considering what should be natural (to be an active militancy that discusses and criticises, among other things, that which questions the management to better encourage things), I feel a confused atmosphere, if not of anger, and so, instead of giving priority to dialogue with our colleague, with our colleague, we see ourselves turning our backs, putting obstacles in the way of others or denouncing the facts before the Commission. On the contrary, communication and dialogue between us should be prioritised, even if thought differently, to facilitate a comfortable discussion framework based on equal opportunities for all. Is it so hard?

However, the saddest thing is that I have already found some colleagues who share much of the diagnosis and criticisms made by Lotuz, but who do not dare to express their position, because of the environment of pressure generated in the environment (conscious or not) and because of the possible consequences it may have as a militant. It's not good news.

But aren't we all members? If something has been done wrong, let us talk, correct, but we do not repeat the internal anonymous complaint, we have no doubt about your colleague. It is the style of other political spaces, not ours!

After all, although it hurts me to confess, I believe that what happens at every moment to so many left-wing forces in the world happens to us. We accept a little critique here and there, a pitch out, but we struggle to accept the critique written in capital letters, especially if it's collective. And it is normal, because it is many hours of work and sacrifice so that what is part of your body comes to put it “upside down” (bad and fast). However, I think there is nothing left to accept it and swallow it as a "bitter medizine" (as the infamous Gorbachev has said), which will believe that it will do us well, even if Congress finally decides to throw it away.

Why do I say this? At least, as a well-known Sortu militant in Pamplona reminded me a long time ago, we are going to have a "real" congress, with alternatives, dialectics, battle of ideas. We shall all open our mouths to decide whether we want follow-up or whether we prefer far-reaching changes. And we should do it from mutual respect, because criticism is no problem, we know how to manage it generously.

Having said all the above, as our Venezuelan loaves say, "everything inside, nothing out." With all its shortcomings, Sortu is the only real political tool to transform the streets of our country and turn them into a space of struggle. All leftist independentists have since today the mission to strengthen their structures and continue to do so, whatever the end result of this congress. The registration of almost 8,000 members is good news.

Let us therefore change everything that needs to be changed and keep what needs to be maintained, but never lose the spirit of affinity. Let's look at each other as if we were the same, and watch out, because we have quite an enemy out there. I will do so, with my pana Arturo, my comrade Andoni and my colleague Jone. I don't know if you're going to vote A, B or Z, but I know you're our peers. Let us not lose sight of it.

* Left Member Abertzale