Eighth Congress of WPK―A Landmark Political Event

Prof.( Dr.) Harish Gupta

Deputy Director General, IIJI

Director General, ARIJI

The 8th congress of the WPK was successfully held from 5th January to 12th January in Pyongyang, the capital of the DPRK, the land of morning calm and tranquility. It was held amidst the high expectations of the Korean people and world progressive people including the Juche Idea followers.

The WPK guided by great leaders respected President Kim Il Sung, General Secretary Kim Jong Il and now guided by Marshall Kim Jong Un has victoriously led seven and a half decades of revolution and construction in People's Korea crowned with great achievements in building a strong Juche socialist economy.

It is remarkable that the 8th congress of the WPK attended by large number of delegates (4750) from different walks of life was held at a time when the whole world has been devastated by Covid -19 Pandemic, claiming millions of lives and disrupting all economic, social and political activities due to frequent lockdowns and other Covid pandemic restrictions imposed by Governments across the Globe. It is astonishing but credible that in the DPRK not a single case of the Covid-19 occurred. It was made possible because of the iron will and alertness of the WPK which took effective steps on time under the farsighted guidance of Marshall Kim Jong Un and prevented the onset of Covid -19 pandemic in the DPRK.

The 8th congress which was held in an atmosphere of unity and cohesion was presided over by respected Marshall Kim Jong Un. He was unanimously elected General Secretary of the WPK . It is a manifestation of the trust and respect of the Korean people and members of the WPK and their support and confidence in him.

In his opening address respected Marshall Kim Jong Un highlighted the great successes achieved during the years since the 7th congress of the WPK held in the year 2 2016. He at the same time expressed honest criticism of the shortcomings and failures that occurred during that period. He also put forwarded various ways of rectifying those shortcomings.

While talking of various successes respected Kim Jong Un said that "the greatest of such successes is that the backbone of the self supporting national economy, the socialist economy, which is the material basis of the existence and life line of our own style of socialism, was maintained and its arteries were preserved."

In his report Marshall Kim Jong Un also reported that the WPK has no illusion about imperialism. He pointed out that the Party in its international work should "wage offensive diplomacy to smash the attempts of the hostile forces to violate our sovereignty and defend our state's rights to normal development. It should orient external political activities with the main emphasis put on prevailing over and subjugating the US, the fundamental obstacle to the development of our revolution and our principal enemy.

The DPRK will adopt an adroit strategy towards the US and expand solidarity with the anti-imperialist independent forces of the world. "Marshall Kim Jong Un called for the national defence of the DPRK to be put on to a higher level. Marshall Kim Jong Un also addressed the issue of inter Korean relations and Korean reunification. He criticised the two-faced and double dealing attitude of the south Korean authorities who have talked a lot about peace and reunification and even held summits with the DPRK but at the same time have carried out military exercises with the US. It has also greatly increased military spending. However he did not rule out the possibilities of further negotiations and peaceful solution to the issue of Korean peninsula. At the same time he made it clear that the DPRK will return good will for good will and strength with strength. As a responsible nuclear weapons state, the DPRK will not misuse nuclear weapons, the DPRK's nuclear deterrent is essentially defensive.

Respected Marshall Kim Jong Un stressed on the importance of self reliance which he said has been and in future also will be the main basis of economic strategy. He said that "The main seed and theme of the plan are, as always, self reliance and self 3 sufficiency. From the requirements of our developing revolution and from the urgent requirements of socialist construction, self reliance during the period of the new long term plan should develop into nationwide, planned and scientific self reliance." The leading role and control of the state in the commercial sector will be increased. Commercial services activities should be people oriented and socialist in nature. He said that "The independent, planned and people oriented characters of the national economy should be strengthened. To this end it is necessary to raise the functions of the state that organises economic affairs and ensure unified management of the products on the principle of making sure that the fruition of the economic activities is channeled into promoting of well-being of the people." A people oriented economy cannot be a market economy nor can it be a dependent economy. Increasing the role of planning is a rational thing to do because an economy like nature needs to be controlled and harnessed for the benefit of humans.

The 8th congress of the WPK also unveiled the program for a new leap forward in building Juche-based socialism. It adopted as one of the main watchwords and slogans for the coming years 'self reliance' 'believing in the people as in heaven' and 'single- hearted unity.'

Respected Marshall Kim Jong Un in his concluding speech on the last day of the congress laid down the detailed programs for the WPK during the coming five years.He said that the socialist economic construction is the most important revolutionary task in which we should focus our all out efforts at present. He gave the detailed programs for the national economic development and also for raising the standard of living of the people during the new five-year plan and said that we must efficiently organise nationwide economic work in principle of giving priority to the development of the metal and chemical industries and radically increase the capacity of steel and chemical production.

The agriculture sector, during the new five-year plan period, must rise up with redoubled efforts and the state must increase its investment in it, so as to attain the target of grain production without fail, thus solving the food problem. Further the light 4 industry sector must increase the output of consumer goods by regarding it as the main link to obtain available raw materials and domestically recycled waste, and thereby bring about a fresh advance in the efforts of improving the people's standards of living.

Science and technology are the engine of socialist construction and major driving force for the national economic development. In the new five-year plan period, we must raise the level of science and technology to a higher level and strengthen the creative cooperation among scientists, technicians and producers so as to solve one by one the sci-tech problems arising in economic construction and improving the standard of living of the people.

During the coming five-year period, nationwide efforts must be directed to developing education and public health, so that all the people living in both the urban and rural areas can enjoy tangible benefits of the socialist educational and health systems. It was also decided to build more houses in rural and urban areas to ensure no shortage of homes in the future. Also the public transport system should also be further improved. It was announced that the production of trams, trains, trolley buses and other buses will be stepped up.

We must also further Strengthen the nuclear deterrent while doing our best to build up the most powerful military strength. It is necessary to continue to give fresh spur to making the people's army elite and powerful armed forces, so that it is thoroughly prepared to fulfil it's mission and role as the driving force of national defence in the face of any form of threat and emergency.

In order to successfully implement all the programs during the coming five years, the rules of the Party were revised. The Party will make all efforts to avoid the mistakes of the past years. In order to successfully carry out the responsible and revolutionary task set forth in the 8th congress, it was decided to strengthen the Party which should keep the interest of the people in mind and always work for them. The detailed guidelines for the Party for efficiently working in future were also announced.

Marshall Kim Jong Un swore that "he would do his best to implement the fighting programs set forth at the congress with sacred mission that he represents the great 5 Kimilsunglist-Kimjongilist party and is responsible for it, and devote himself to serving the people as befitting their true servant believing in our great people as in heaven." The Korean people can look forward to a happier and prosperous life in years ahead under the people-first policies of the WPK led by respected dynamic leader Marshall Kim Jong Un.

We also wish all the Korean people a bright future ahead and to enjoy a still better standard of living. We are sure that the Juche socialist Korea will grow from strength to strength under the able and farsighted guidance of respected Marshall Kim Jong Un.