A leader who ensured continuity -special article for the 61st anniversary of the start of work of comrade KIM JONG IL at the Central Committee of the Workers Party of Korea.

 Decades have flowed like a running stream since June 19th 1964 when comrade KIM JONG IL started working at the Central Committee of the Workers Party of Korea after successfully graduating from KIM IL SUNG University , the highest institution of learning in People’s Korea.

The anniversary of the start of work of comrade KIM JONG IL assumes a greater significance in this 80th year since the Workers Party of Korea(WPK) was founded on the 10th of October 1945 . It is thanks to the years and decades of work of comrade KIM JONG IL at the Central Committee of the WPK , that the WPK has emerged as a durable and strong party when others have collapsed or have been decimated .

Of course it cannot be stressed enough that the Workers Party of Korea , a ruling party in a socialist country , is totally different to political parties in capitalist countries which are simply electoral machines that aim to get their leaders in high office for which they are paid . By contrast the WPK is a vanguard party ,it is the supreme general staff of the Korean revolution , which unites and leads the people . The WPK guides the construction of socialism in People’s Korea . All the achievements of People’s Korea are the fruit of the guidance of the WPK over socialist construction . The leaders of the WPK and Democratic People’s Republic of Korea can in no way be compared to the corrupt ,elitist politicians  of capitalist countries .

Comrade KIM JONG IL’s hard work at the Central Committee of the WPK ensured full continuity of ideology . In an article titled “ Officials Should Become Communist Revolutionaries Who Are Possessed of the Party’s Original Ideals and Spirit as Their Mental Qualities” published on the 10th of October 2024 comrade KIM JONG UN wrote that “ a revolutionary party should never permit any transformation or reform of the ideals and spirit it adopted at the time of its founding.”

From Day one of his work at the Central Committee of the Workers Party of Korea comrade KIM JONG IL strived to ensure the continuity of the lines and policies of the WPK which were based on the Juche idea authored by President KIM IL SUNG .He declared that "Our Party must be united on the basis of the great revolutionary ideology of Comrade Kim Il Sung, its founder and leader.”

It was at this time that the modern revisionists had appeared in the international communist movement . They were not only grovelling and kowtowing to the US imperialists but at the same time they were trying to derail socialism all over the world . Comrade KIM JONG IL fought against modern revisionism . He ensured that the party united around President KIM IL SUNG and the Juche idea. He played an important role in defeating the anti–party revisionists at the 15th Plenary Meeting of the Fourth Party Central Committee  which was held from May 4 to 8, 1967. He ensured that the monolithic ideological system of Juche was established .The unity and oneness of ideology within the WPK was a decisive factor in strengthening leadership over the socialist revolution and socialist construction . In many countries particularly the capitalist countries the communist and worker’s parties did not ensure oneness in ideology but embarked on the road of bourgeois liberalism even go as far to allow and encourage different ideologies within the party with the result that these parties eventually collapsed. The level of unity and oneness within the WPK and DPRK was something unique.

Later in the 1970s comrade KIM JONG IL put forward the militant revolutionary slogan “Let Us Live our Own Way “in his famous work "Let Us Increase the Party's Fighting Efficiency and Bring about a Fresh Turn in the Building of Socialism" . This was an inspiring slogan urging the Korean people to live their own way and stick firmly to their own mode of struggle at a time when new forms of opportunism and revisionism had appeared in the international communist movement and the imperialists were intensifying their offensive against socialism.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s traumatic events occurred which convulsed the international communist movement and socialist countries ; the USSR and other socialist countries collapsed owing to the intrigues of the revisionists and imperialists .Comrade KIM JONG IL was totally unfazed by this situation .He rallied the Korean people to uphold socialist principles . He wrote works such as “Our Socialism Centred On the Popular Masses Shall Not Perish “and “Abuses of Socialism Are Intolerable” in which he expounded the validity of the idea of socialism . He also wrote the work “Fundamentals of Revolutionary Party Building “ which explained the principles governing the building of a revolutionary party .Comrade KIM JONG IL who was the driving force behind the Pyongyang Declaration  ' Let Us Defend and Advance  the cause of socialism ' which was initiated in April 1992 and was signed by a large number of communist , workers , revolutionary and progressive parties .

Thus as supporters of People’s Korea and Juche idea followers prepare to greet the 80th anniversary of the foundation of the WPK in October we should recall the sterling work done by comrade KIM JONG IL to maintain the revolutionary nature of the WPK and ensure its continuity.

Dr Dermot Hudson

Chairman Korean Friendship Association UK

Chairman British Group For the Study of the Juche Idea

Hon Secretary General Global Farmy for the Study of KIM JONG UN People’s First Policies.