ISSUE 92 | MAY 2015
alternatives to globalisation
Zuma Administration Shawn Hattingh Syriza and the Impasse Michael Blake Stirring the Spirit of the Murdered Miners Liduduma’lingani Mqombothi My Struggle Phillip High Zumanani Shawn Hattingh UN and Women’s Day Nandi Vanqa-Mgjima My Organisation Abahali baseFreedom Park Imperialism Part 2 Leonard Gentle
THE SCANDALS AROUND PRESIDENT ZUMA: ARE THEY SYMPTOMS OF LARGER PROBLEMS?
© 2012 Zapiro (All Rights Reserved) Printed/Used with permission from www.zapiro.com
President Jacob Zuma’s presidency has been defined by non-stop scandal. There have been clear instances of him using his position for personal gain. News headlines have repeatedly highlighted how members of his family, along with his allies, have benefited from state tenders, or have been drawn into partnerships with certain capitalists, such as the Guptas.
Beyond this there have been outrages such as the Marikana massacre; the militarisation of the police; and the police being deployed in parliament. Zuma has even been accused of intervening to remove people in institutions such as the Hawks and the South African Revenue Services (SARS) that have threatened to investigate the financial scandals surrounding him and his allies. In other words patronage and growing repression have been features of Zuma’s tenure.
BUT IS IT JUST JACOB ZUMA? The danger though of focusing solely on Zuma, and seeing all of the scandals as simply being linked to his clearly flawed personality, is that it runs the risk of missing the point. The happenings around him are symptoms of much wider problems that exist in our society. These problems are linked to how 1994 only brought liberation for a few and how white capital
Continued on page 2... WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
1
Lead Story remained in control of the private sector. These problems also include the form neoliberalism took in South Africa; how the state has been a site for accumulating wealth; and how competition to gain top positions or access to the state has become intense. The turn towards repression under the Zuma regime is also due to the growing unhappiness amongst the black working class with all of these developments.
LIBERATION FOR A FEW 1994 did not bring liberation for the working class, and the black majority.
Sections of the ANC elite have, therefore, been using the state since 1994 to accumulate wealth through various ways including large salaries and perks for top positions in the executive, parliament, government departments and parastatals. At times self-enrichment has taken the form of corruption. Links to the state or top politicians have ensured access to BEE and directorships in established capitalist corporations. In this there are echoes of how a white Afrikaner elite used the state to leverage opportunities for self-enrichment under apartheid. In fact, like Zuma, both Mandela and Mbeki – and those close to them – became rich through the state. The tendency to use the state for self-enrichment, therefore, predated Zuma’s presidency.
ND U O R A NINGS E P OF P S A M O T P THE H SYM E R A A ZUM LEMS B O R P ETY IDER I C W O S H C R MU N OU I T S I X THAT E Rather it was a deal between a black and a white elite. This deal assured white capitalists that their wealth would not be touched. In return the ANC leadership was allowed to take over the state. In other words, capitalism was maintained, including the harsh exploitation of the black working class, but the faces in the state changed. In the context where apartheid had stunted the rise of black capitalists, the state has become the key site through which an ANC elite could build itself into a prosperous black section of the ruling class.
THE STATE AND ACCUMULATING WEALTH This was possible because the state not only protects and furthers the interests of sections of capital under capitalism and ensures minority class rule; but it also generates a section of the ruling class in the form of the top politicians and officials that head it. In fact there is a long history across the world of a-state based elite using their positions for self-enrichment – this to a greater or lesser degree has been and is a feature of all states.
2
The agendas of neoliberalism and creating a black section of the ruling class have been linked in South Africa. The outsourcing of state services, therefore, has also been vital in building up the wealth of sections of the ANC leadership since 1994.
HEAD THE STATE AT ALL COSTS The fact that the state has been key to accumulating wealth for sections of an ANC elite has meant that competition for access to top state positions has been intense. Many factions in the ANC have wanted and continue to want to enter into the state or have access to its resources. As a matter of fact, many of those who backed Zuma against Mbeki were individuals – including Julius Malema – that wanted access to top state positions or access to tenders. Some had been excluded in the past by the Mbeki faction, and they backed Zuma in order to gain access to the top of the state and the wealth which that would bring. Once their man was in the presidency, the remnants of this faction began brazenly using their connection to Zuma to accumulate
WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
wealth. Some received positions in the executive and the parastatals while others received tenders. Many also used their connection to the presidency to leverage business opportunities.
PROTECTING AT ALL COSTS President Zuma’s intervention in institutions such as SARS and the Hawks, and the firing of officials that have threatened to investigate him and his allies’ affairs have been about protecting Zuma along with others in the faction that promoted him. To be sure a tendency towards protecting allies already existed during the Mandela and Mbeki administrations. In the early 2000s Mbeki, for instance, ensured that investigations into the Arms Deal were stalled. Likewise, under both Mbeki and Mandela, power was centralised increasingly under the president. Mandela at times used his power to push through unpopular policies such as the GEAR policy. Such precedents in all likelihood emboldened and enabled Zuma to intervene in institutions such SARS.
A TURN TO GREATER REPRESSION The Zuma regime, however, has by no means had everything its own way. The brazen selfenrichment of the Zuma faction, and continued racial and class inequality in South Africa, have also meant that the ANC is beginning to lose its legitimacy amongst the black working class. This has seen growing protests amongst the working class. In the past, the legitimacy that the ANC enjoyed meant a lid could be kept on this. This is no longer the case. In the face of growing protests, and in the face of losing legitimacy, the Zuma-led state – like states that have faced a similar situation – has turned towards repression. Hence, the scandals such as Marikana and the militarisation of the police.
CONCLUSION The scandals surrounding the Zuma regime, therefore, are symptoms of much deeper problems in South African society. Ultimately only a struggle by the working class to fundamentally address the problems faced in South Africa can end the symptoms we are seeing associated with the Zuma regime.
International News
SELL-OUT AND IMPASSE IN GREECE? Syriza has been a governing party in Greece for two months. In the week after the election victory, the new Prime Minister, Alex Tsipras, the new Finance Minister, Yanis Varoufakis, as well as other leaders reaffirmed that the Coalition of the Radical Left would proceed to carry out the party’s main programmatic and electoral commitments – stopping privatisation, reemploying dismissed public sector, raising the minimum wage. On their side, the representatives of the Troika – comprising the European Union, the European Central Bank and the IMF – adopted a hard line, insisting on no departure from the existing loan agreement that contains the hated memorandum with its austerity terms. The outcome of negotiations between the new Syriza government and the Troika is an agreement signed with the Eurogroup of European finance ministers. Syriza has been granted a four month period of extension on existing loan arrangements. New negotiations for further loan money – to pay off debts and to ensure a budget for government salaries, services and programmes – will take place in June. This is subject to Syriza carrying out the terms of the extension agreement. However, the agreement with the Eurogroup suggests that Syriza has capitulated to the capitalist masters of Europe and reneged on its commitments to its supporters.
A ROTTEN AGREEMENT Prior to the elections, Syriza promised to cancel most of the debt and to scrap the austerity memorandum. However, on the eve of the agreement Tsipras signalled that he wanted to avoid a “mutually destructive clash” with the Troika and in fact sought a “win-win” situation. As it turned out, the agreement committed Syriza to “complete fully and swiftly all of its financial obligations towards its partners”. In other words to honour all its debts and to enforce existing austerity and neoliberal measures. The agreement includes a new acceptance of the need for a budget surplus as opposed to a
deficit. Many, including the Left Platform – the main Left opposition tendency in the party – have noted that this inevitably means the Syriza government itself will carry out further austerity measures. By signing the agreement, Syriza has reneged on big commitments, including those related to: privatisation, labour market reforms, retrenched public sector workers, the minimum wage and pension reform. In the immediate term, at best, those worst affected by the “humanitarian crisis” will receive a measure of relief.
AN IMPASSE The current public debt owed by Greece is €320 billion and expenditure on debt is 177% of GDP; and the scheduled repayments of the loans will continue interminably: so Greece is effectively bankrupt. No amount of ‘extra time’ negotiated, ‘smart’ politics or ‘clever’ tactics and manoeuvres will enable Syriza to avoid the real impasse posed by the debt question and the power wielded by the Troika. Within the EU framework there is no win-win situation, certainly not for the impoverished working class. Quite simply, the Syriza government has no control over the Greek economy; the neoliberal ‘opening up’ of the economy and the inherent logic of capitalist economic power within the European Union forbids this. The party’s commitment to stay within the EU means that Greece has to proceed according to the neoliberal dictates of the Troika who represent the big banks and corporations of the leading countries.
SYRIZA UNDER STRAIN Opposition to austerity has been the main unifying basis of Syriza as a party. Now this is under severe pressure.
Support for the Left Platform has grown from just over 25% at the party launch in 2012 to about 30% at its first congress in 2013. The Left Platform registered its principled objection to the agreement with the Eurogroup, accusing the Syriza leadership of a “total abandonment of the election commitments”. At Syriza’s Central Committee, its proposed
amendments to the agreement with the Eurogroup, included a call for the adoption of “a perspective of an alternative plan promoting the full realization of our radical objectives.” As many as 40% of members of the Central Committee voted for the amendments. Manli Glasoz, a Syriza member of parliament and a 94-year hero of the resistance to the fascists in the 1940s, rejected the deal unequivocally and saw fit to “apologize to the Greek people for having assisted in this illusion.” He went on to also call for “the members, the friends and supporters of Syriza, in urgent meetings at all levels of the organization, (to) decide if they accept this situation.”
SYRIZA AND THE WORKING CLASS? Syriza is a new party that does not have a longstanding and organic connection with the Greek working class. While it secured over two million votes, constituting 36% of the total, this is by no means overwhelming. Notably, over the past fifteen years a big and growing percentage of the working class has refrained from participating in elections at all. Furthermore, Syriza’s actual membership is quite small, estimated at 35 000 in 2013. However, the election results suggest a significant surge in support among the working class: over 50% of the unemployed, over 40% in the working class areas of the big cities and just over 40% of the youth vote. No doubt this support is a result of the strong anti-austerity stance of Syriza. In the light of the rotten deal and the economic impasse, the threat of disappointment and disaffection on the part of the working class will grow, especially if their social and economic position worsens.
A WAY OUT? For the working class of Greece, the impasse demands the cancellation of the debt, an end to austerity and a break from the stranglehold of the Troika. Yet there is nothing to suggest that the Tsipras government has proceeded with such a strategy in mind. In the next period, the working class must find the political and organisational means to develop such a strategy.
WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
3
Cultural Page
STIRRING THE SPIRITS OF THE MURDERED MINERS: A REVIEW OF THE PLAY ‘MARI AND KANA’ On Thursday, 13 March 2015, at Cape Town’s Company Gardens, during the Infecting the City Festival, a public arts festival in the City of Cape Town, something unspeakable happened. The widows of the Marikana Massacre victims, in a play titled Mari and Kana, were trying to wake up their husbands from their graves by yelling at them. Marking the gravesite, in front of the Iziko Museum, were thirty-nine white crosses laid out on the lawn.
was made up of Aphiwe Livi, Azuza Radu,
During the play, the dead miner’s restless spirit circled above the Company Gardens. Even now, days after the crosses have been removed and the actors have long left the stage, the chilling atmosphere set by the play still hangs there.
walked on the graves, their mother’s faces were
The performance took place in front of the Iziko Museum, under the invasive statues of colonial rule. The space allowed the performance to be expansive, spreading out on the lawn. The play was haunting and convincing such that it became convincing that the miners were really lying in those graves. The play depicted reality with such preciseness that parts of it became the reality it was depicting.
On Friday evening, during its second
Mari and Kana was presented by Theatre4Change Therapeutic Theatre. The cast
To an extent the performance does this but also
Thembelihle Komani, Thumeka Mzayiya, Abonga Sithela, Slovo Magida, and Lingua Franca. During the performance, the gravesite was real such that when the homeless men and women who have made Company Gardens their home roamed around, within the graves, stomping on the graves of the dead, a chill rushed through my body. When kids fled their parents and mortified. It was more than kids stomping on a stage, this was a gravesite, and nobody walks in the gravesite unless they are there to talk to the dead in the way that people talk to the dead.
performance, speaking to the director, Mandisi Sindo, the plot, he told me, was a narrative of two children, Mari and Kana, coming out of jail and finding their mothers grieving for their dead fathers. Sindo explained to me that the purpose of his theatre group, Theatre4Change Therapeutic Theatre is to help people heal.
it does something else, something more terrifying
than helping people heal. It opens wounds that have not healed. When the actors ran frantically from one grave to the next, looking for their loved ones, shouting all the thirty-nine people who were massacred in the Marikana Massacre, screaming at them to wake up, one did not experience the feeling of healing but grief, anguish and the spirit of the dead circling around. Even after the performance ended, the crosses never became mere props in a play. One could not walk on the lawn, where they were and not feel like stomping on the spirit of the dead. Azuza Radu and Thumeka Mzayiya, the two leading actors were not concerned with the technicality of acting or entertaining the audience, this is not to say they do not how to act or entertain. Their acting was very real such that they were not simply playing widows looking for their husbands. When they kneeled on their husband’s graves, screaming and cyring at them to wake up, one wished they could walk to the stage and comfort them. The play made its way into one’s heart not only with the dance but also with the text. The lyrics and the poems were poignant. The poetry was delivered without the accent of poetry or the dramatisation of dramatic theatre. “It is you black police. He will never send us money. He will never write us a letter.” The text of the music still haunts me many days later after the show. It echoes and echoes in the back of my mind, like a voice faintly and continuously yelling in the dark. The play had no denouement because it would have been cheating its own narrative. The way it ended was with a song of healing, with an upbeat and somber lyrics. “The day of the sun rising is coming. The heaven is not going to rain and thunder forever. Heal my son. Calm down my son.”
Photo: Liduduma’lingani Mqombothi
4
WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
Long after the actors had left the stage, the audience had dispersed, and the stage was cleared of its props, I was left staring into the empty space where the play had taken place, reimagining it, dismissing it, attempting to abandon it there and not take it with but the play is still replaying in my mind, over and over again, action by action, haunting me to remember the Marikana Massacre.
My Struggle
PHILIPPI HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS On the morning of the 6th of March 2015, we as the Philippi High Students decided that each student will go the Western Cape Department of Education (WCDE) in order for each of us to ask and get answers ourselves. When we arrived at the Cape Town Central Train Station the South African Police Service (SAPS) was already there waiting for us. They asked to speak to our leaders; we told them we don’t have any. They then asked who is in charge. Why are we there? Where are we going? We told them that our entire school is made up of shipping containers and that we are going to ask for ourselves from the WCDE when are they planning on building a proper school for Philippi High. We made it clear to the police that we are not marching nor protesting. They appeared like they understood us and that they supported our cause. At this point they offered to escort us to the WCDE. As we walked to WCDE, however, more police arrived. After a while some of our students saw one of the WCDE employees talking to the police. After this the behavior of the police got even worse. We then heard a noise which turned out to be a police Nyala. The Nyala came towards us. We sat down, but it attempted to make us move by driving towards us as if it intended to run us over. Directly after this the police then started to count down from 5 and they then threw something at us. We did not know what it was at the time, but we heard a massive bang that sounded like an explosion (we later learnt these may have been stun grenades). This was followed by repeated bangs. We also did not know at the time and even now whether they were also shooting at us with rubber bullets, as some of the police were armed with shotguns that could fire rubber bullets.
us, and told us to go back to the township as we did not belong in the city centre Five students were badly injured, 4 of them were later were admitted to the Somerset Hospital. One was bleeding from the mouth; another learner was burnt from the first grenade that landed in her lap; and some were beaten (some of those that were beaten though went home to recover and were not hospitalised). With all of this happening one girl also fainted and was unconscious and couldn’t breathe for a while. Two of us tried to help up the girl that fainted. One woman from the Department came to assist us and she took us to the office on the top floor of the WCDE. They left us alone with her for about an hour and during this time we were not sure whether she was going to be fine. Later the women from the WCDE came back with a first aid kit and a male colleague – he gave us a toilet paper as part of offering help. A couple of minutes later the paramedics came and gave her oxygen and they told us to go. We have since laid charges of assault against the police. In the wake of what happened, on Monday of the 9th, a group of officials secretly visited our school to meet with our principal. We strongly believe again that they had no intentions
of meeting us and hearing us out. We also strongly believe that they have no plans for our school. When we noticed that the officials were preparing to leave our school without talking to us, we left our classrooms to go and speak to them before they were gone. When we spoke to them it was clear they really had no feasible plan for building a school as they told us: “We had already planned for our school in the area, but we have no land to build it on … that a school doesn’t get built over a night … we should be patient as it will take at least two to three years or more to build even if land is found…we are looking a piece of land… your parents and the whole community should help us in this process.” We realized that they were telling us all of this to try and stop us mobilising – because how can you build a school when you have not earmarked land for it. Even if they do build a school in the next three years, which seems unlikely given they have not earmarked land for it, it would mean most of us would have already left Philippi High. We have all vowed that we will not stop organising until the WCDE presents a feasible plan. CONTACT Athule 0613758950 or Nosihle 0840421588
As we ran from the police we went towards a corner in order to get away from them and the stun grenades they were throwing. We all feared for our lives as we did not know what these were. Most learners lost their shoes; while the tracksuit uniforms of some were also burnt and ripped by the stun grenades and perhaps rubber bullets. As part of this, the police then forcefully pushed and shoved us as a group towards the Cape Town Train Station. In this way they herded us towards the Station. While pushing, shoving and even hitting us they repeatedly called us the “K” word, threatened us, insulted
Photo: Anele Selekwa
WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
5
A ZUMANAMI OF INTERFERENCE? Over the past few months President Zuma has intervened – via his ministers and appointees – in a number of state institutions like the National Prosecutions Authority (NPA), the SABC and parastatals like Eskom.
USING THE STATE TO ACCUMULATE WEALTH
Various people that were threatening to investigate issues such as Nkandla, the Arms Deal and the businesses of capitalists associated with Zuma, removed from office.
• After 1994 the state has been used by an ANC elite to accumulate wealth
These have included allegations of intervening in the Hawks and the South African Revenue Services (SARS).
• This situation has led to intense competition for top positions in the state
Here we look at the possible reasons for this, along with the actions that have been taken.
6
WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
• When the ANC came into power in 1994 the private sector was mainly controlled by white capitalists
• This has taken the form of large salaries, tendering opportunities and using the state to leverage Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) deals
• In 2007, this competition saw a faction around Zuma – who wanted Zuma as president to gain top positions in the state or to ensure business deals through connections with the state – oust a rival faction centred around Thabo Mbeki
Centre Spread
MAKING HAY WHILE THE SUN SHINES • Since Zuma became president those around him have been using their positions in the state, to accumulate wealth as rapidly as possible • This has included top state officials – among them the president – being awarded massive salaries • In fact Zuma has massively expanded the number of ministers and deputy ministers to ensure opportunities for those around him to get positions in the state • Zuma himself is also one of the top paid head of states in the world • If his salary and perks – such as security, vehicles, and expenses for his wives – for the first term of his presidency are added together, it has been estimated that the state spent over R 500 million on him • Top ANC families that are part of the Zuma faction – such as the Mantashes and sections of the Mandela family – have benefited from tenders • Capitalists that backed his drive for the presidency have also regularly got tenders or have been given preferential treatment (such as the Guptas being allowed to use a military base as part of arrangements for a family wedding) • Many of these capitalists have made large donations to foundations associated with Zuma • People within the Zuma faction have also become partners of capitalists, such as the Guptas, that backed Zuma’s rise to power
INTERVENING IN THE HAKWS? • Shortly after Zuma was elected president, the Scorpions were abolished • The Scorpions had been investigating over 700 fraud and corruption charges against Zuma • The Scorpions were replaced by the Hawks • Allegations have surfaced that the Zuma administration is now interfering in the Hawks by ensuring that people within the Hawks, such as Anwar Dramat, that have been investigating Nkandla are removed from office
INTERVENING IN SARS? • In late 2014 Zuma appointed a new commissioner at SARS, Tom Moyane • Moyane is close to Zuma and soon began suspending meetings of SARS’s management structures and he dismissed some managers, including the deputy commissioner, Ivan Pillay • Moyane claimed that he did so because SARS was running an illegal covert unit that was unlawfully undertaking surveillance operations and even ran a brothel to do so • Allegations soon emerged that Pillay and other managers were fired because they were investigating the tax implications of Nkandla, along with investigating the possibility that capitalists aligned with Zuma may have been involved in tax evasion
SOUTH AFRICA IS NOT ALONE • If Zuma and his ministers are interfering to stop investigations, it is not exceptional • Heads of states in many countries – such as Britain, France and Italy – have done similar things
• Under capitalism and the state systems such abuses regularly occur, although the Zuma administration is perhaps more brazen than most
• In the USA during the Presidency of George Bush there was intervention from the top of the state to try and stop possible investigations into Dick Cheney’s businesses • Under Thabo Mbeki the executive blunted attempts during the early 2000s to investigate the Arms Deal • This has to do with how an elite controls all states and how they use the state to protect not only the interests of capital in general, but at times their own personal interests • It seems possible that the Zuma faction are using the power they have at the top of the state to try and stop investigations into business deals and corruption they are associated with WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
7
Gender Page
INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY: THE HYPOCRICY OF THE UNITED NATIONS March 8 was International Women’s Day. Celebrated throughout the world since 1911, its roots lie in the socialist struggle of the 20th century. But these celebrations are now dented by the effects of neoliberal capitalist policies and sexist, tribal tendencies. All too often across the globe women are assaulted, abused, exploited in their homes and places of work at the hands of sexist masculinity and the patriarchal-capitalist system. Overt discrimination of women is pervasive. Women are raped, assaulted, humiliated for the choices they make (bearing children as single parents, wearing kanga, lesbians), and discriminated against at work and by the state.
TO N E M O W AND T N O R BE 'F THE N I ' E R CENT WORLD
SOOTHING WORDS FROM THE UN The UN Chief, Ban Ki Moon, praised its commitment to gender equality, stating that women had to be ‘front and centre’ in the world, especially on issues like peace and development. He claimed that progress has been to slow and uneven. In her address at the same event in New York, the UN Women Executive Director Phumzile Mlambo-Ngucka stressed how rational equality is and the many benefits that stem from boosting the status of women. She claimed that when there is gender equality, girls and boys will go to school and they will prosper; when there is gender equality there will be equal pay and poverty will be reduced etc. Women from working class communities are saying no! “Only when we have access to water, electricity, quality education there will be gender equality. Privatization, liberalisation, labour flexibility are the root causes of gender inequality.” Both Ban Ki Moon and Mlambo-Ngcuka evoke a misleading message on an important issue of women’s emancipation. Their message is loaded with a rhetorical element that could be analyzed on its uselessness and unreality. Lest they forget to mention that capitalism is the root cause of gender inequality, is indicative of the institution they represent – the United Nations. The United Nations is premised from false declarations of peace and love and yet conniving fear nations are in control over other. No wonder institutions such as IMF, World Bank and WTO whose policies have had an immense negative impact and socially and economically on women – through policies such the Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) and GEAR. The UN has never been a democratic organisation. It represents the interests of the powerful nations and not the poor of those nations. This is why capitalism attacks social reproduction viciously in order to win the battle at the point of production. This is why it attacks public services, pushes the burden of care onto individual families, and cuts social care in order to keep the entire working class vulnerable and less able to resist its attacks on the workplace.
INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY IN SA In South Africa, an Africa for Africa Women’s Conference was held in Port Elizabeth in
8
WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
a bid to celebrate International Women’s Day. A high-level panel of political leaders (including President Jacob Zuma and UN Chair Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma) and women in business convened to offer some answers to “their” burning questions. Such as how to create a vibrant and dynamic network of women leaders and entrepreneurs to actively champion the cause of women’s emancipation in Africa. President Jacob Zuma gave a key note address. What a sad moment for those who are engaged in the struggle against patriarch and capitalism – the women who are constantly attacked by a sexist, misogynistic, tribal President. South Africa’s president has constantly displayed a vivid disregard for women, gays and lesbians. To Jacob Zuma women are his property. Women must conform themselves to his traditionalist ways of living. His patriarchal, homophobic utterances contravene the very same values espoused in the country’s constitution. I am at pains to also want to believe that Mlambo-Ngcuka is championing this cause of gender equality while her own foundation seeks redress. The UN Director employs 6 staff members of whom 5 are male 1 a female in lower position. At the same time Zuma’s bloated cabinet has fewer women and as director generals.
CONCLUSION Through out the globe various women’s movements are engaged in the struggles against patriarchy and capitalism. These movements struggle for the total emancipation of women. Despite these efforts and current gender sensitive laws and institutions, globally women, particularly the poor, are facing an onslaught against their woman hood. Women are still trapped in poverty. They are still deprived of their rights to decent shelter, to water, electricity, optimal access to health and quality education. The withdrawal of the services by the state has worsened the position of women. The relaxation of labour laws and the deregulation of trade by the state have led women to engage in the informal economy, unemployed, underemployed. Working class women’s movement must create powerful feminist movements whose struggles are waged from a class and gender perspective.
My Organisation
ABAHLALI BASEFREEDOM PARK We are residents of Freedom Park. We are ordinary residents, youth and women and men who are excluded from the decision-making process in our housing development process. Others are members of the following organisations: South African Communist Party, Socialist Party of Azania, Economic Freedom Fighters, African National Congress and National Freedom Party.
HOW WE STARTED On the 19th of July 2014, frustrated by the lack of reponse by the Councillors of both Wards 24 and 119, we decided to embark on a mass protest against electricity cut-offs in our community with the hope of getting the neccessary attention of those responsible to address our electricity needs. Instead of receiving the attention we needed we saw some members of the local leadership of the African National Congress talking with the police and after their talk, the police shot at us and one member of our community was wounded and slept in hospital for a week. We decided to organize ourselves through the formation of block committees and the launch of street committees. In our block and street committee meetings we discussed various issues affecting our community through open discussions and debates. We developed a set of demands with regards to the housing development in our community and its economics. Therefore, these demands we are making were developed through an extensive consultation and democratic process.
OUR DEMANDS We want Freedom and the Power to determine the future of our community. By this we mean the development and construction process in our area should be controlled by the community and its various democratic structures. In other words, a democratically-elected committee comprised of community members must oversee and control the development process. Enough is enough of having our lives controlled by people and institutions who do not have our best interests in mind. We do not want to be
controlled by the wealthiest individuals who got their wealth by excluding our community from decision-making processes and are fronts for white-owned small businesses in order to continue the exploitation and oppression of our community. We are demanding transparency and accountability. We want information on the previously plans and designs with regards to our housing development. We also demand information on the future plans of the council so that we as the community can take charge of our development process. We demand decent housing fit for the shelter of human beings. The houses that have been built so far are worse than the matchbox houses of the apartheid regime. We want proper houses to be built. By this we mean a house that is 60 square meters with interior toilets, bathrooms, heating systems and telephone lines. We believe that if the government gives the housing development process to the community instead of private companies, then we as the community will develop cooperatives, with the government aid, and build decent housing for ourselves rather than maximize profit at the expense of our community. We demand free health care for all members of our community. The state and municipality have to ensure that the community has uninterrupted access to water, electricity, health, HIV AIDS treatment, and education. All these services have to be provided free of charge. The community, through assistance by the government, has to control the provision of all these services. The health care workers employed by NGO’s must be directly employed by the state and health education and research programs must be developed to give all our community members access to advance scientific and medical information, so we may as the community have proper medical attention and care for ourselves.
AN END TO PRIVATISATION We want an end to the privatization of our housing development and construction process. We believe that the consultant company managing our housing development process has extracted a lot of profit from the money budgeted for housing development, and now we are demanding the overdue debt of Corporate Social Investment of over 13 years’ period of housing development in the Golden Triangle Communities. The consultant company managing the housing construction process in our community has
promised through its policy on Corporate Social Investment to contribute to social and economic development of our community. We will accept the payment in money which will be used to develop cooperatives and other community development programs. This development consultant company that is managing our housing development process is now aiding individuals who are taking part in the super exploitation of the members of our community through fronting for white small business owners who get subcontracts in the housing development project. We demand full employment for our community. We believe that local government and government as whole is responsible and mandated by our votes to give every person employment or guaranteed income. We believe that if the money injected in our community through housing development by the government will not give full employment, then the consultant companies managing the housing development must be removed and be replaced by the community cooperatives administered by the government and managed and controlled by the community so that the people of our community can organize and employ all its people and attain a high standard of living. The development must contribute to the reduction of unemployment in the area not be about a small group of wealthy and reactionary young people. Workers working on the construction sites in the community must enjoy all trade union rights as entrenched in the constitution and all related pieces of legislation. Development in the area should include the building of community centers such as community halls, playgrounds, public crèches, parks and libraries. We want education for our community that exposes the true nature of the rotten state of our community. We want an education that teaches us our true history and our role in the present day community of Freedom Park. We want quality education that is fully funded by the state. We believe in an education system that will give to our people knowledge of self. If we as people don’t have knowledge of ourselves and our position in society and the world, then we have little chance to relate to anything else. We believe that Johannesburg University situated in ward 24 must open itself for research programs directed at helping our community with advanced scientific and technological information, so that our community can have a lifelong learning from the cradle to the grave. We demand that development in the area be suspended until the municipality meets all these demands.
WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
9
Section Topic
PART 2
EDUCATIONAL SERIES
IMPERIALISM, GLOBALISATION AND THE STATE: UNDERSTANDING CURRENT DEBATES In the first article of this series we spoke about imperialism as that concept which helps us to understand how it is possible for some countries to dominate others even though they may not have formal political control over or occupy those countries – as was the case with colonialism. The
But funnily enough the term, imperialism, is hardly used by many activists today. Instead, a narrative of fear-mongering dominates all our media and influences the way activists think. This is a narrative that makes us simply fear what is called “terrorism” – which is the code word used by the media and governments for Muslim people – or Western hate-figures like Russia’s Putin, North Korea or China. From the side of the USA, and rival imperial powers, and those who support the current world order, the world is best understood as one in which there are those countries who have democracy and development and conflicts exist today because “noble” countries such as the USA are forced to fight wars to defend or extend democracy. This is associated with the Liberal Interventionist School. On the other hand, many activists – who are anti-capitalist and critical of US power – do not use the term, imperialism, because they argue that the world today is best understood as one in which we are living in the period of “globalisation” and that the enemy of social justice is the Transnational Corporation (TNC). We shall look at these and other debates in this second article of our Educational Series.
THE LIBERAL ARGUMENT This is the view that systems of democracy and public order are associated only with countries such as the USA and Western Europe – and more recently, Japan. The rest of the world must “catch up” with these qualities. These qualities are the also assumed – by this argument – to be associated with what is called ‘development’ and so the world is divided into “developed” countries and the “developing’ countries who are all trying to “catch up” with the model they see in front of their eyes. In more recent times some people who support the current world order have added other qualities to the “developed” countries of the USA and Western Europe – good qualities like women’s rights, gay rights, freedom of expression and other human rights. This poses a challenge for activists everywhere – even if you don’t like the USA invading Iraq or bombing Syria or controlling Saudi Arabia. Surely Saddam Hussein, Bashir Asad and the Saudi monarchy are even worse. And how can anyone deny that when it comes to Boko Haram or Islamic State (ISIS) maybe it is good that the USA, France or Britain should come and rescue defenceless people?
USA is that major power today. But much of how the world is today can be also be explained by different imperial powers trying to compete with the USA for that domination or by the struggles of people trying to throw off the yoke of imperialism’s power over their lives.
So the liberal view simply endorses imperial violence in the name of human rights and development.
THE GLOBALISATION DEBATE In the 1980s and 1990s many scholars and journalists claimed that the world had changed and become a borderless society in which technological developments – such as the internet – and free trade agreements had made the nation state irrelevant. They called this development “globalisation”. Supporters of the current capitalist system saluted this development and claimed that it was all good and that there was no alternative. In response many activists who were critical of capitalism took this myth of the end of the nation state seriously and declared that Transnational Corporations (TNCs) were the drivers of globalisation and getting rid of the nation state. TNCs, they said, were behind such institutions as the World Bank, the IMF and the World Trade Organisation. These comrades conducted campaigns against the WTO and some even called for “globalisation from below”. In the case of South Africa these activists tended to lay the blame for neo-liberalism on the IMF and the TNCs rather than the ANC government. And when they speak of the TNCs they attach little significance to the fact that South Africa, too, has its own TNCs who dominate the African continent. This view tends to under-estimate the role of the nation state: as the vehicle for power of TNCs, and as the vehicle for driving the system of global finance capital. It is just that some states – the vast majority of which are in poor countries – have little power while a few rich states can use institutions like the IMF, the World Bank, the WTO and other means to dictate to poor countries. And it is the TNCs and the financiers of these few countries who use the domination of their powerful states over all others to shape the world so that they can make profit. Which takes us back to the notion of imperialism …
IS THE USA THE ONLY IMPERIALIST
10
WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
Section Topic
EDUCATIONAL SERIES
POWER? Today those activists who do employ the notion of imperialism often have the USA in mind when they do so. To be sure the USA dominates the world – it has the largest military, it controls 2/3 of the world’s trade, international trade is conducted mostly in its national currency – the dollar – and its TNCs are the largest in the world and their tentacles extend everywhere. Much older comrades may remember the time when Britain was the dominant power and South Africa – until at least 1910 – was once its colony. Britain is now clearly a lackey of the USA – which is why its military largely acts to support any US invasion of any country. The US rose to its domination after World War 1 but this was consolidated after World War 2 when what was called the Bretton Woods Agreement created the global architecture of the rule of the dollar. But, more recently – ironically within a few short years after the USA triumphantly watched the collapse of the Soviet Union – many activists have begun to note that the USA often doesn’t get its way in intentional fora – like the United Nations – and that at key moments in its wars against Iraq, Syria and Libya it has face challenges from France, Germany and Russia. And, even more recently, its control over world trade through the dollar, being the world’s currency, is being challenged by China. Despite these developments today some argue that the USA is still the ultimate imperial power and that these tensions are largely being conducted on terms determined by the USA. This view argues that the USA is the imperial overlord which allows minor skirmishes within a system over which it is dominant. The view goes on to argue that even those who challenge the USA do so within strict limits. Against this view is a very different one that says that there is very real world of rival imperialisms today that are actually challenging US power. This view suggests that even South Africa is now a smaller but yet rival imperial power to the USA – with the African continent being one site of this contestation and China’s challenge to the US dollar, as the world’s currency, being the other.
So what is imperialism? It is time to dig a bit deeper and develop our understanding in the next article: Theories of Imperialism.
ES T A N I M O D A S U THE LD R O W THE
TO COME 3
Theories of imperialism
5
Imperialism and South Africa, then and now – how we have used terms
4
Imperialism and War
6
Imperialism today
WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
11
LOCAL GOVERNMENT: DEBATING STRATEGIES TO BUILD OUT MOVEMENT The 2015 April Conference St Peters, Rosettenville, Johannesburg 11 and 12 April 2015 After 1994 democratic Local Authorities had to be established for the first time for the black majority and, in terms of the compromises of the new Constitutional negotiations, these Local Authorities were given additional responsibilities for delivering services. At the same time the institutions of Local Government have had their transfers from the national fiscus drastically cut – by almost 90%. In this the ANC government has followed in the path of other neo-liberal states in that:
• It has shifted the delivery of services such as water, cleaning and sanitation to Local Government. • Even though housing is still a national function it is the Province and even the Local Municipality that deals with many issues of housing allocation and administration of land on which communities build their shacks. • It has privatised and outsourced so many services to private capitalists and so invited local corruption. With less money for Local Government costrecovery and the collecting of payments have become the passion of the officers of local government. Municipalities with rich citizens can flourish from their taxes – with some
c i l b u p G I ILR 15 0 2 s m u r fo Every month ILRIG hosts a public forum to create the space for activists from the labour and social movements as well as other interested individuals to debate current issues.
upcoming public forums
All public forums are held every last Thursday of the month at Community House, 41 Salt River Rd, Woodstock from 6 – 8.30 PM.
Philippi High and the struggle for quality Education
Transport home and refreshments are provided.
26 march
30 april Rhodes must go: What does transformation really mean?
City Councils even borrowing on international stock markets. But the Municipalities serving the poor are however in a constant state of crisis on no resources. This is often mixed with corrupt practices of outsourcing services to relatives and friends. Recently some comrades have campaigned to set up their own Municipalities, whilst others have gotten involved in the Government’s IDPs programmes. With Municipal Elections scheduled for 2016 activists have even debated whether to set up their own candidates. While others continue to call for boycotts. The 2015 April Conference will bring together activists from communities and workers involved in new forms of self-organisation to discuss and debate these questions.
WE WANT TO HEAR FROM YOU Now is the time to start building our new mass movement. Last year, ILRIG’s Educational Series focused on the historic forms that united fronts and people’s movements took. This month we continue our Education Series on Imperialism to bring to our readers a broader perspective on such forms of oppression. We hope this will deepen our discussions. Our vision is to interact with our readers on the shape of things to come. This is an appeal to you to join discussions on Facebook: ILRIG SA and Workers World News – as well as Twitter: #ILRIGSA. You can also write to the editors on info@ilrig.org.za. We have also set aside a page for poetry, songs, reviews and readers’ comments. Please help us make this an inspiring space by sending us your contributions and views. Check out our website and join current deabtes: www.ilrig.org
CHECK OUT OUR WEBSITE AND JOIN CURRENT DEBATES WWW.ILRIG.ORG The site will allow viewers to find out more about ILRIG, its history, staff and board. It provides an interactive space for interested people to engage with ILRIG’s work on globalisation – read articles, contribute to discussion, and order publications. Website members will receive regular updates on issues of interest.
021 447 6375
info@ilrig.org.za
Room 14, Community House
41 Salt River Road
ILRIG SA / Workers World News
Listen to ILRIG on Taxi Radio on http://thetaxi.co.za/line-up/ every Thursday between 12.00 and 13.00
12
WORKERS WORLD NEWS | No. 92 | May 2015
#ILRIGSA