Text tabled : A7-0390/2011

  Ilda Figueiredo (GUE/NGL), in writing. – (PT) It is up to the Croatian people, in the first place, to make the decision as to whether or not to join the EU. The Portuguese experience shows us that the EU’s process of capitalist integration has meant, and still means, first and foremost, the destruction of productive capacity and employment, the growing dependence of the country on the major powers of the EU, and a loss of sovereignty on key elements that would have allowed our people to realise their wishes and aspirations.

As the integration of economies is a dialectical necessity, its development within the framework of the capitalist system and the unequal development that this entails only favours the major powers and monopolies, particularly financial monopolies, impoverishing countries and peoples, sacrificing democracy and impeding the fight for economic and social systems that make work and human wellbeing their first and only priority.