Basta!

Qana. The Internet is full of images of dead children from Qana. Again. At least 37 counted so far. They were in a shelter. Ten years ago the Israeli colonialists killed 100 women and children in the same village. In a shelter. It is known as the Qana holocaust. Israel has no right to exist. Israel is a settler colony. Whether a colony was established in 1948, 1652, or 168 BC, or at any other time it has no right to exist. South Africa should have nothing to do with it. We should shun it completely. One person one vote in a unitary state is the doctrine upon which South Africa was liberated. There is no other standard. Why is our government supporting a “two state solution”? Whose idea is that? We know what colonies do. They beggar their neighbours. They underdeveloped the whole of Africa. Why do we betray our own knowledge? In the words of an honest Israeli, Israel Shamir: “In order to become Light Unto Nations, the Jews had to put the Nations into complete Darkness”. See the linked article below. The man writes like a god. He says: “Hezbollah are the true heroes of the Middle East. Not because of their might, but because of their compassion. They are the only ones who felt compassion with the plight of Palestinians. They did not remain indifferent observers at the Rape of Gaza - they tried to stop the violator with their modest means, like England protested the German conquest of Poland.” South Africans have been complacent. We have been behaving as is there was only one colony left: Western Sahara, colonised by Morocco. By the way, Morocco is an ally of Israel. It is far worse than that. Please read the linked US article of Michael Neumann below. Colonialism is undoubtedly closing once again upon the whole world like a constricting serpent. Colonialism degrades all, and especially the colonists. Often it claims to be “humanitarian”. But colonialism kills, and goes on killing until it is killed, as it must be. These linked writings below are moderate writings. They are not even communist writings. They are even tainted here and there with the very thing they criticise. But their overall lesson cannot be denied. We have to go to the masses now, trust the masses, trust ourselves, and organise the biggest mass movement the world has ever seen, against colonialism, again. The wedding feast at Cana (Qana) is where Jesus turned water into wine. This struggle needs no miracles, just a straightforward anti-colonial struggle, something we know very well how to do. Let’s do it again and this time, finish the job. Click on these links: Friends, True and False, Israel Shamir, Counterpunch (2502 words) White Intervention, Michael Neumann, Counterpunch (1509 words)

No Apology

In the face of political difficulty the English language becomes ambiguous. For example, the crucial English word “subject” can each be used to two opposite things: either a free or a bound person. This is also the case with the word “agent”. The meaning of freedom is always contested. The word “author” in English derives its primary meaning from the Latin “auctor”, meaning an originator. An originator, by definition, has to be a subversive transgressor of a previous status quo or orthodoxy. How the rebel “author” becomes transformed through language into a conservative “authority” looks somewhat mysterious at first sight. But it actually shows very well how, under a bourgeois class dictatorship, everything is bent to the purposes of the bourgeoisie, even including the language itself. Everything subversive, if it cannot be crushed, must be co-opted. Any original act will always open the author up to charges of stealing or wasting time. Likewise, money freely given to a friend could, or even must, be held by a bourgeois judge to be “corruption”, whereas if the same money was paid for a consideration in the rotten cause of capital it would not be found corrupt. Within ANC ranks and in “ANC Today” some of the defenders of black bourgeois economic empowerment would even try to domesticate the work of Karl Marx and turn it to their purposes. The revolutionary author Marx becomes in their mouths (as once in the mouths of Eduard Bernstein and Karl Kautsky) all of a sudden an apparent supporter of capitalist class formation! This Communist University blog is an author but not an authority. It does not bow to conventional wisdom per se. Nor does it try to set up a new conventionality. It is an author respecting other authors, forever. It is for freedom. Guest bloggers, please apply – or set up your own. The CU will be happy to help. Hence if this CU should say that Jacob Zuma is not in the camp of the Imperialist monopoly finance bourgeoisie, whereas Cyril Ramaphosa, Bulelani Nggcuka, Saki Macozoma, Penuell Maduna, Mzi Khumalo and others that have been mentioned are indeed in that Imperialist comprador camp, then you are free to disagree. And several people have recently disagreed. We await a written explanation of their point of view. Until it arrives in finished form we can only guess what it might be. Comrade Zuma lives in a large house – rented. He has a country place – consisting of a collection of rondavels. He has money – borrowed. But even if he had a lot of money of his own, like his fellow ex-Robben-Islander Nelson Mandela, so what? Is that the point? As the great Shivji pointed out this month in his valedictory lecture: capital is not a thing, it is a relation. The oppressed poor don’t usually begrudge the rich their riches. They would like to have such riches, too. They seem to know very well the crucial difference between the good wealth and comfort that they desire, and the exploitative capital relation that differentiates them and drives them down, whether as workers, peasants, petty bourgeois, or unemployed and destitute. Knowing all this, it should be easy to discriminate between a merely rich man, and a capitalist. To illustrate this distinction Karl Marx (in Capital Vol. 1) calls the merely rich man a “miser”. By contrast with such a simply rich person the capitalist may properly own very little (e.g. the late Brett Kebble). The capitalist is distinguished by being a master of the relations of capital, which if investigated are found to be a spectacle, an illusion, and a fraud of humanity. Yet the difference between a Zuma and a capitalist is still not clear to some of our critics. Tomorrow Jacob Zuma goes on trial on charges of corruption, while the masters of the generally corrupt relationship called capitalism go free, demanding respect and honours. Today, on the day of the 85th anniversary of the founding of the South African Communist Party, the same Jacob Zuma will address the SACP’s anniversary rally on behalf of the African National Congress. The poor people understand all this very well. They support Zuma. Others don’t understand it. They find it “ironic”. We await their further and better responses. Meanwhile, Jacob Zuma does not look like a capitalist or a miser or a corrupt person from here. Which leaves him as a free-willing individual, and his supporters as free choosers of their own leadership, something we should respect. By all means expect an agenda from Zuma. There is time for that. The ANC electoral Congress is in December 2007 and the national election in 2009. Vukani Mde’s excellent reflections (from his Weekender Political Diary) on all this are linked below. The Johannesburg YCL political school meets today at 11h00 in the SATAWU offices, 13th Floor, Old Mutual Building, 29 Kerk Street, between Harrison and Loveday Streets, Johannesburg. They will be studying Jeremy Cronin’s “Neo-liberalism, reformism, populism and ultra-leftism”. Next week they will be discussing Lenin’s short but powerful works on women (linked below). Click on these links: Lenin on Women, 1919 – 1920 (4097 words) Mixed birthday messages for SACP, Vukani Mde, Weekender (456 words) We dabblers shall overwhelm the NEC, Vukani Mde, Weekender (333 words) So who is it gonna be, Vukani Mde, Weekender (198 words) From China with love and PS, Vukani Mde, Weekender (303 words)

Fundamentals Of Change

The African National Congress' message of congratulation to the South African Communist Party on the occasion of the SACP’s 85th anniversary will be formally delivered at the SACP national rally in Pietermaritzburg on Sunday 30 July 2006 by ANC Deputy President Jacob Zuma. The ANC’s brief written statement says that democracy in South Africa is not possible without the work of the SACP. This is no less than the truth. See their linked statement below. The SACP’s event tomorrow will have a theme of “Build Peoples’ Economy”. See the linked notice. In another, slightly longer statement, the SACP summarises its own history and contribution. See the link below. The strike to begin at Kumba Resources on the same day (see the linked NUM report below) is a good reminder that the class struggle continues come rain or shine, and does not pause even for the anniversaries of its own movement. Kumba is a major company in South Africa. It is significant to note that the “Solidarity” union of mainly white workers is in unity of action with the NUM at Kumba. The name “Solidarity” was deliberately chosen as a provocation to the communists, and perhaps as an apology to themselves by these organised white workers. But the logic of class struggle propels them back into line, time after time, behind the good leadership of COSATU-affiliated unions like NUM. The Communist University is scheduled to meet again on Friday, August 4th at 17h00, in the Women’s Jail, 1 Kotze Street, Constitution Hill. At our gathering yesterday we decided to dedicate next week’s session to a discussion of COSATU’s pre-Congress document called “Possibilities for Fundamental Social Change”, linked below. Click on these links: ANC on SACP 85th anniversary (416 words) SACP Statement on its 85th anniversary (438 words) SACP, 85 years of unbroken communist struggle in SA (1391 words) Kumba will be on strike come Sunday, Eddie Majadibodu, NUM (261 words) COSATU 9th Congress political discussion doc, Fundamental Change (14712 words)

Revolution or Neoliberalism

The Communist University meets tonight at the Women’s Jail, 1 Kotze Street, Constitution Hill, Braamfontein at 17h00. The topic of discussion is excerpts from Rosa Luxemburg’s “Reform or Revolution”. Later on, at 19h00 at the John Moffat Building on the Wits University East Campus there will be an event called “Is Labour History?” Comrades may wish to go from the CU to the Wits U, taking the question of “Reform or Revolution” with them. Next week we had scheduled to repeat the SACP Gauteng Province’s scheduled session on Gender and the Socialist Revolution but up to now have no text to circulate. If anyone can assist please do so. On July 15th the great Issa Shivji gave a farewell lecture on the occasion of his “formal” retirement from the University of Dar-es-Salaam. The “Dar Campus” has produced a treasury of works, including those of Walter Rodney and Mahmood Mamdani. Shivji’s lecture, obviously a classic and obviously not his last, is linked below. Click on this link: Shivji, 2006, Lawyers in Neoliberalism (9929 words)

Peace The Priority

The recent articles in various newspapers, including City Press, about Cyril Ramaphosa’s possible rebirth as a political contender meant little, on the face of it. They were a transparent example of empty boosterism. What they signal is not the return of Cyril, but the demise of the Phumzile project. The reason for the ruin of Phumzile Malmbo-Ngcuka’s presidential ambitions is the lurking presence of husband Bulelani, who is now a heavy member of the grand bourgeoisie. What the grand bourgeoisie, always lethally competitive within its own ranks, must have as state leadership on behalf of its class is a non-player. This is what damns Cyril’s chances, too. Not only is he too personally embroiled in monopoly finance capitalism. He also has the fatally feared backing (according to the City Press) of the rogue bourgeois Mzi Khumalo. The other big bourgeois cannot afford to give too much power to one of their own. They would prefer a Louis Bonaparte, or else a reformist stooge, of which there are many examples in the world. Tony Blair is one. The relative neutrality of the bourgeois state is not a complete myth. Of course it is not neutral in class terms. It exists to maintain the relation of capital. As Issa Shivji has recently reminded us, in a magnificent chop-job on the modern Bentham, Hernando de Soto: Capital is not a thing, it is a relation. Thanks to Patrick Bond, Shivji’s lecture will go out from here tomorrow. The neutrality required of the state is not that between class and class. The neutrality that is required is that between bourgeois and bourgeois. State power must not be allowed to be used by one bourgeois to subordinate the rest. Such a thing would be fatal to the bourgeoisie as a whole. Hence the recent rehabilitation of Jacob Zuma in the eyes of the bourgeois media, which we may expect to proceed further during the coming collapse of the second set of charges against him, i.e. Bulelani Ngcuka’s “prima facie case” that never was. A Zuma presidency will not be a proletarian dictatorship. Nor will it be a triumph of one big bourgeois over the others. Hence, and for both these reasons, it looks more and more like the safest option. This is what the proletarian leadership has been trying to tell the stupid bourgeoisie all along. And the penny is beginning to drop, at last. The first priority of the proletariat is peace, and rightly so. Working-class activity is peaceful activity. The tripartite alliance has kept the peace, and with it the potential for the advancement of political consciousness. We have had enough experience, in South Africa, of the random violence of the irrational dogs of war. We have enough examples of war in front of us even today, such as Iraq, Palestine, and Lebanon. If you have any doubts about the necessity of peace, read the two linked accounts below of the situation in those three countries. These are bourgeois wars: bourgeois on bourgeois. They are business wars. South Africa has to avoid them at all costs. The collapse of the WTO Dohar Round has made such local Imperialist wars more likely all around the world, even to the remote “Southern Tip” of Africa. For an example of the peaceful, international way the working class does its business compare the third link, on FAWU’s campaign for the Kraft workers. This is how working-class consciousness advances. It is only possible in a peaceful world. War destroys everything. Click on these links: Nothing Good Can Come from This War, Uri Avnery, Counterpunch (1890 words) More Than 100 Iraqis Being Killed Each Day, P Cockburn, Counterpunch (2150 words) FAWU calling Kraft consumer boycott, national, international action (464 words)

Mass And Constitution

Today is the 53rd anniversary of the legendary assault on the Moncada Barracks.in Cuba, one of that revolutionary county’s two great national days. We salute our brave and friendly Cuban comrades! Further concerning constitutions and in the absence of the “best in the world” Paris Commune constitution, it is a mistake to think that higher authority must always come down and “sort out” a local (or Provincial) problem. The late Rob Amato used to call his Sunday Independent column “Separation of Powers”. Maybe he did so with a sense of irony. At any rate, communists believe in the centralisation of all power in the hands of the (armed) people. In brief, this is the meaning of Power To The People! It means power from the bottom up, and not from the top down. The practical way to possess at least a “right of recall” in the present time is for the rank and file to know as well as, or even better than the platform, what are the rights and procedures of meetings. Above all, the chairperson must be reminded whenever necessary that he or she is the servant and not the master of any meeting. This is a knowledge that can be learned and a skill that can be practised. The first linked document below contains extracts from the British communist Wal Hannington’s famous manual on the Rules of Debate and Procedure of Meetings called “Mr Chairman”, first published in 1950. Some may say the title is sexist. But perhaps Hannington, too, was being ironic, and had the bullying, booming, stereotypical male in mind. Whether that is so or not, Hannington’s little book is the best we have on the subject. The WTO Dohar Round of talks has collapsed. See COSATU’s linked statement, below. The struggle continues. The Imperialists will seek to pick off countries one by one in unequal bilateral relationships, while the anti-Imperialists will seek to construct effective alliances. Iran is one of the major anti-Imperialist countries and it is directly threatened by war. Trade, Imperialism, war and peace are inseparably linked. Mass organisation for peace and justice is the best recourse. At Wits University in Johannesburg a three-day event kicks off on Friday evening at 17h00 at the John Moffat Building on the East Campus called “Is Labour History?” The jokey title panders to those revisionists and liquidationists who have always wanted to declare the end of mass organised labour and to deny its revolutionary destiny. The real question put by history is still “Reform or Revolution?” but the evasive academics don’t want to ask that one. They will take a slow train, stopping at all the small stations, hoping never to arrive at the main revolutionary point. See the linked document below. The ANC had an NEC meeting last week (see the link below). It announced among other things the preparations for ANC's 52nd National Conference. The NEC resolved that the National Conference would be held in December 2007. The National Conference is the highest decision-making structure of the ANC, and is held every five years. The National Conference is preceded by an extensive process of deliberation within all structures of the movement, beginning at the level of the ANC branch and including the convening of a National Policy Conference. The NEC resolved to hold the National Policy Conference in June/July 2007. Study “Mr Chairman” and be prepared. The circumstances of the death of construction worker Themba Manyathi are intolerable. See the linked COSATU statement. What kind of country is this? On Friday, July 28th in Pretoria, marchers will gather at the Frik Eloff Park, corner Rosemary and Lynwood Roads, Lynwood, Pretoria, at 13h45. They will then march to the Israeli embassy where a rally will be held. Click on these links: Mr Chairman, extracts, Procedure at meetings (1516 words) WTO talks collapse, statement of COSATU (377 words) Challenges facing labour movements, Wits University, 060728-31 (456 words) ANC NEC statement following NEC of 060721-22 (1397 words) Death of Themba Manyathi, statement of COSATU (330 words)

Constitutions

The SACP Constitution was revised in April last year at the Special National Congress. The new version was published more than a year later. Here it is linked below. It may be needed in the coming days and weeks. Parts 6 to 22 (more than two thirds of the whole) deal with the structures of the Party and part 23 deals with discipline. Johannesburg Central Branch of the SACP passed a resolution last Sunday fully supporting Cde Zico Tamela, the branch’s member, nominee and now duly elected Chairperson of the SACP Gauteng Province. Cde Zico has been told that the incumbent members of the Provincial Executive Committee (PEC) will not accept him. Other members have met in a purported Provincial Working Committee (PWC) without him, and without letting him know. The branch passed a resolution that the PEC member who punched Comrade Zico in the July 16th meeting of the Provincial Council should be suspended pending a disciplinary hearing (and possible police action). Nothing of the kind has happened. Instead, the comrade who assaulted Zico was to be found among the honoured SACP PEC delegates to the COSATU Gauteng Provincial Congress last weekend. The branch on Sunday passed a resolution that the election to replace the four vacant “additional member” PEC positions should take place immediately. These positions could have been filled at any of the last three Provincial Councils, in accordance with the PC’s expressed wishes and the SACP Constitution. Instead, shameful scenes of deliberate delaying tactics and even barricading of doors by the incumbent office-bearers have taken place. The PC meeting of July 16th, scheduled to start at 09h00, did not conclude until 17h00. No food was provided, nor transport home for the delegates from all over Gauteng. To admit such failings within the SACP is bitter, but a cover-up would be worse. A cover-up would be even more disreputable than the disrepute the incumbent members of the SACP Gauteng PEC have already brought upon the Party. They are abusing their positions, and have been doing so for years past. There are other examples of their bullying that will have to be fully opened up to scrutiny in due course, having to do with money matters and with membership records and withholding of electoral rights. The SACP Constitution says: “Between Provincial Congresses, the Provincial Council shall be the highest decision-making body in the province.” The Gauteng PEC is presently defying its Provincial Council while claiming powers and authorities for themselves that they do not have, and attempting to intimidate and silence people who bear witness to their violations. For students of constitutions, the difficulty is that although the PC is the higher body, the PEC members are the officials who must call its meetings and make its arrangements. Hence (and also in the ANC) there is the phenomenon of BECs that meet but do not hold BGMs nor even AGMs, and so on upwards through the structures. Betraying the membership, elected people perpetuate their terms of office, always hoping that the masses will go away and leave them alone to enjoy their comfort. Office-bearers are the custodians of the Constitution. When they are the ones who are betraying it, there is a crisis. Bureaucratic position-hogging will be cured when we all have an established right of recall and no fixed terms: In other words the Paris Commune constitution, which is the real “best in the world”. Rob Amato’s column was quoted here yesterday, not knowing that he had already perished in a car accident on his way home from the same COSATU Provincial Congress mentioned above. The tributes from the Star and from COSATU, linked below, will no doubt be only the first among many. His was an individual voice, such as make up a true society, worthy of the name. We cannot be free without such people. Meanwhile as usual, a great variety of mass action takes place. See the linked reports of the campaigns around the Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital, the International Transport Workers’ Federation, and two heroic FAWU strike actions at the Schoombee Landgoed farm, and the Kwality Biscuit factory. Click on these links: 2005, SACP, Constitution (5637 words) Rob Amato, respected writer on legal issues, The Star (417 words) Rob Amato, tribute from COSATU (163 words) Chris Hani Bara Transfomation Project Update 060719 (1004 words) ITF Congress press conference and running order (954 words) Schoombee Landgoed and Kwality Biscuit strikes, FAWU (350 words)

We Are All Hizbullah

The Johannesburg Central Branch of the SACP will hold its Annual General Meeting (AGM) from 10h00 to 14h00 on August 20th, 2006, at the SATAWU offices, 13th floor, Old Mutual Building, 29 Kerk Street, between Loveday and Harrison Streets, Johannesburg. The Johannesburg Communist University distribution list is up around 850 members and the number of CU web page views is approaching a quarter of a million. Our weekly study circle is consistent and high quality. The CU is a serious labour movement phenomenon and is widely emulated. Yet no mainstream academic has ever studied it. Probably there would be no funding for such a project. Bolshevik political studies are disregarded in the official groves of academe. Reformist workerism is orthodoxy there. So the wide world must be our university if revolution is our aim. In London on Saturday there was a fine march in solidarity with Lebanon and Palestine. See pictures of it on the home page of the Communist University wikispace web site. COSATU is pushing for a change in the electoral system towards constituencies and away from gross proportional representation, or PR, the national party list system that we have now. See the linked article from the Sunday Times, below. All electoral systems have their disadvantages and advantages depending on your point of view. Constituency elections will be better for democracy and for parliament, as COSATU points out. Louis Luyt was a former fertilizer, beer and rugby tycoon and partner of Eschel Rhoodie in the Infogate corruption scandal of the 1970s. This particularly corrupt relationship gave birth to the English-language Citizen newspaper using taxpayers' money slipped secretly to the conspirators by the National Party government of that time. Luyt later showed what was possible with the present SA electoral system. Even though the political party he launched had the ridiculous initials (to English-speakers) “FA”, Luyt successfully picked up small fractions of votes all over the country in 1999 and got into parliament. If the South African Communist Party put up candidates under the present system it would do a lot better than Louis Luyt did. For this reason COSATU’s proposal for constituency-based elections may be heard with considerable interest by the ANC . Yet, as Rob Amato points out in the article from the Sunday Independent linked below, the constituency system also holds good possibilities for proletarian candidates. In addition, Amato in effect reviews the HSRC book “Trade Unions and Democracy”, launched last Thursday. You can find the text of the book on line here. The Johannesburg Young Communist League Political School will convene from 11h00 to 13h00 on Sunday July 30th at the SATAWU offices, 13th floor, Old Mutual Building, 29 Kerk Street, between Loveday and Harrison Streets, Johannesburg to discuss Jeremy Cronin’s paper “Neo-liberalism, reformism, populism, ultra-leftism”. See the link below. Click on these links: COSATU pushes for electoral changes, Sunday Times (684 words) COSATU wants constituency-based electoral system, Sindy (907 words) Neo-liberalism, reformism, populism, ultra-leftism, Cronin, 2005 (5550)

Proud Communists

Although there has been no proper communication from the branch office bearers, it appears that there will be a Branch General Meeting of the SACP Johannesburg Central Branch today at 10h00 in the usual venue, which is SATAWU offices, 13th floor, Old Mutual Building, 29 Kerk Street, between Loveday and Harrison Streets, Johannesburg. The scheduled date was last Sunday, July 16th, being the third Sunday of the month, and comrades (including our veteran and CC member Esther Barsel) did turn up at the appointed time and waited. However, the SACP Gauteng Provincial Council (PC) was held on that day. One of the main items on the agenda for today is a report-back of the dramatic events of that PC, and its subsequent repercussions. SACP branch member, founder member of the Communist University, and previous Johannesburg District Chairperson Zico Tamela was elected Provincial Chairperson at the July 16th PC last; but it now appears that SACP Gauteng Provincial Secretary Vishwas Satgar is disputing Cde Zico’s election. And there are other particulars that may be best left for the branch to hear directly, only because all the details are not yet clear. The first of the further two main items on the branch agenda for today (which the CU only received quite late last night) is the report back from the recent SACP Johannesburg District Congress, which among other things took a position on the “State Power” debate initiated by the SACP’s discussion document, which itself was partly a consequence of Johannesburg Central’s resolution to the SACP Special National Congress in April 2005. So this matter is of great interest and importance to the branch. The other main item is to be a presentation on the lessons to be drawn from the recent SATAWU security guards strike, another matter of great significance and importance. The SACP is not a clandestine party. It has forced itself into a position of legality following a forty-year period of persecution (1950 to 1990). It is not to be separated from the masses and it has no secrets from the masses. Let nobody, whether from inside or from outside the party, tell Communists that their deliberations are to be kept hidden as if they are once again forbidden. The Communist University is under pressure to divorce itself from its historic mother body, the Johannesburg Central Branch of the SACP. It will never do that. It would rather meet under a tree than go back to the dark days of pretence and disguise that illegality and persecution forced upon the Communists in the days of National Party rule in this country. The Communist University is open to all and has wide support. Let it continue to take its place honourably among others without special restrictions or special pleading. It must defy restrictions. It must not apologise for its existence. Friday’s ANC Today contains, after ANC President Thabo Mbeki’s weekly letter, a long anonymous article entitled “Our 21st century Marxists declare war on black capitalists”. It will not be archived by the Communist University. The issue of anonymous articles in publications of the ANC, which are partisan in an open national debate is a scandal. The leadership of the ANC has no business to issue anonymous articles at all. Such statements should be in the name of a structure, which duly and constitutionally adopted them, or by named officers in their official capacity, or by named individuals as individuals. An anonymous “line” sent down from above with no attribution is a shocking violation of everything the ANC should stand for. Comrade Eddie Webster (of SWOP, CHI and HSRC) objected to yesterday’s post. Everything possible will be done to provide him with a remedy. Best of all will be for him to have the most prominent right of reply that can be arranged. In all other respects: “We stand by our story!” There are no links today. The Israeli colonialists continue to “degrade” (destroy) Lebanon and to kill people there and in Gaza. The press is full of lies about it. There is no end to this war other than the destruction of colonialism and the institution of one-person-one-vote in a unitary state of Palestine.

Empire Versus Democracy (repeat)

Sometimes the former colonialists can be sharper and more angry about the monstrous brutality of Imperialism than its victims of today. Perhaps it is because writers know the lies from the liars’ side, and so are more sure of themselves than the poor people under the bombs, who may not know truth or lies when faced with sudden death and destruction on an unbelievable scale. Good anti-colonial writing of this kind comes today from the British Richard Gott and the US Paul Craig Roberts. Some may have thought that the colonial era was past. They were wrong. See the first two links below. In South Africa on the other hand (as Richard Gott hints) white intellectuals and such black followers as they can muster write weasel words in an attempt to damn our democracy with faint praise. The biggest and strongest component of our democracy is COSATU. Cde Zwelinzima Vavi is its General Secretary. He made a strong speech at the launch of the HSRC’s compilation on “Trade Unions and Democracy”. So good was it that Professor Eddie Webster felt compelled to attempt to upstage it. Ostensibly giving a vote of thanks to his principle guest at the conclusion of the event, Webster threw courtesy to the winds and spent a long time trying to beat down the points that his guest had made. He failed miserably, producing only embarrassment. Vavi’s points were too strong for him. Read them in the linked document HSRC publishes well-produced books but also makes the entire text of all these books available on the Internet. This is not only highly progressive in terms of access, but makes good business sense too. Far from the Internet taking away from sales, HSRC is convinced that it increases sales by up to 200% over what they would otherwise have been. Their web site is here. The effective institutions of democracy in this country are the three main alliance partners, COSATU, the ANC, and the SACP. The national parliament and the provincial legislatures are as aware as anybody else, or maybe even more than anybody else, that democracy does not live in their dusty halls. At best it pays an occasional visit, but mostly it is not found there. This is because people’s power is not vested in these institutions, which are not sovereign and are subordinate to the appointed judges. So now the public relations advisors of the legislatures have come up with a corporate road-show to augment the periodic elections to these bodies with something called “participation”. The elected representatives don’t even have confidence in their own institutions. They want to hide behind something called a “Public Participation Process” which in this case means a free lunch for 500 people at a hotel in Boksburg, given in exchange for these 500’s patience in listening politely while public notables make speeches at them for the benefit of the TV cameras. Is this what "Power To The People" has been reduced to? You judge. See the linked document below. Apologies to those who may have received this message once already. For some reason the message did not return this morning. Hence the repeat sending. Click on these links: British empire brutality continues, Richard Gott, The Guardian (890 words) The Shame of Being An American, Paul Craig Roberts, Counterpunch (1624 words) Z Vavi input at launch of HSRC book Trade Unions and Democracy (1244 words) Democracy degenerates to a road show, Gauteng Media Release (304 words)

Empire Versus Democracy

Sometimes the former colonialists can be sharper and more angry about the monstrous brutality of Imperialism than its victims of today. Perhaps it is because writers know the lies from the liars’ side, and so are more sure of themselves than the poor people under the bombs, who may not know truth or lies when faced with sudden death and destruction on an unbelievable scale. Good anti-colonial writing of this kind comes today from the British Richard Gott and the US Paul Craig Roberts. Some may have thought that the colonial era was past. They were wrong. See the first two links. In South Africa on the other hand (as Richard Gott hints) white intellectuals and such black followers as they can muster write weasel words in an attempt to damn with faint praise the democracy that we have. The greatest and strongest component of our democracy is COSATU. Cde Zwelinzima Vavi is COSATU’s General Secretary. He made a strong speech at the launch of the HSRC’s compilation on “Trade Unions and Democracy”. So good was it that Professor Eddie Webster felt compelled to attempt to cap it. Ostensibly giving a vote of thanks to his principle guest at the conclusion of the event, Webster threw courtesy to the winds and spent a long time trying to beat down the points that his guest had made. He failed miserably, producing only embarrassment. Vavi’s points were too strong for him. HSRC publishes well-produced books but also makes the entire text of all these books available on the Internet. This is not only highly progressive in terms of access, but makes good business sense too. Far from the Internet taking away from sales, HSRC is convinced that it increases sales by up to 200% over what they would otherwise have been. Their web site is here. The great institutions of democracy in this country are the three main alliance partners, COSATU, the ANC, and the SACP. The national parliament and the provincial legislatures are as aware as anybody else, or maybe even more than anybody else, that democracy does not live in those dusty halls. At best it pays an occasional visit, but mostly it is not found there. This is because people’s power is not vested in these institutions, which are not sovereign and are subordinate to the appointed judges. So now the public relations advisors of the legislatures have come up with a corporate road show to augment the periodic elections to these bodies with something called “participation”. These representatives don’t even have confidence in their own institutions. They want to hide behind something called “Public Participation Process” which in this case means a free lunch for 500 people at a hotel in Boksburg, given in exchange for these 500’s patience in listening politely while public notables make speeches at them for the benefit of the TV cameras. Is this what Power To The People means nowadays? You judge. Click on these links: British empire brutality continues, Richard Gott, The Guardian (890 words) The Shame of Being An American, Paul Craig Roberts, Counterpunch (1624 words) Z Vavi input at launch of HSRC book Trade Unions and Democracy (1244 words) Democracy degenerates to a road show, Gauteng Media Release (304 words)

Reform Or Revolution

The Communist University meets tonight in the Women’s Jail, 1 Kotze Street, Constitution Hill, at 17h00 to discuss Chapter 9 of Frederick Engels’ “Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State”. The opening will be done by Ntombi Mutshekwane. Next week we will discuss excerpts from Rosa Luxemburg’s “Reform or Revolution”. See the linked document below. This fortnight’s Umsebenzi Online contains an 85th Anniversary article by South African Communist Party Deputy GS Jeremy Cronin and a polemical article by Young Communist League National Secretary Buti Manamela. Wee the link below. William Lind is a US military theorist who calls his concept “fourth generation warfare” (4GW). This amounts to the same thing as saying that in an anti-colonial struggle, the victory of the revolutionaries is certain, not only in spite of, but actually because of the mismatch of forces. See his linked article about Lebanon. At least it is not liberal hand-wringing. Click on these links: Reform or Revolution compilation, Luxemburg, 1908 (10250 words) Umsebenzi Online, 19 July 2006, 85 Years of Unbroken Communist Struggle (3571 words) Why Hezbollah is Winning, William Lind, Counterpunch (768 words)

International Brigade

COSATU GS Zwelinzima Vavi will be the main speaker this evening at Constitution Hill (Women’s Jail Atrium, 1 Kotze Street) at 18h00 the occasion is the launch of a book called “Trade Unions and Democracy”, published by HSRC. The Palestinian heroine Leila Khaled met with COSATU office-bearers and later addressed the media in COSATU House yesterday, making a powerful impression. Together with COSATU’s President Willie Madisha she made the call for a huge international mass movement to put a stop the assault upon humanity that the unrestrained Israeli colonialist aggression represents. COSATU will use all its international influence to this effect. COSATU calls upon the South African government to withdraw its ambassador from Israel and send the Israeli ambassador in SA back. See the linked statement. Today in the morning there will be a further planning meeting of an ad hoc steering committee charged with planning the Free the Cuban Five campaign in September and October this year. On July 26th there will be a general meeting to further consolidate the plans and also to celebrate the Cuban national day. See the linked minutes. Those who hide their past are condemned to repeat it. The Spanish Civil War (in which the communist writer on liberty, Christopher Caudwell whose work the Communist University has often studied, was killed) was an enormous historical event, quite recent in time. It is not known how many communists and other democratic republicans were killed there in battle or later, in cold blood. The linked article tells a lot of this history but by no means all of it. More Spanish communists and republicans were killed in the German Nazi concentration camps, for example. But the article gives a good idea of what lies under the carpet of European appearances of respectability. Click on these links: COSATU meets Leila Khaled (719 words) Free the Five meeting 060707 (925 words) Spanish Civil War, 70 Years On - Deafening Silence, Counterpunch (3071 words)

Working Class Action

Leila Khaled, the freedom fighter and ambassador for the Palestinian people, will meet COSATU officials today in COSATU House. See the notice linked below. 280 bus drivers are on strike in Mafikeng. The employers are former TGWU trade union members, who bought the company in a BEE deal, but have proved to be as bad as any other bosses. The striking drivers have COSATU’s support. See the linked press release. NUMSA is mobilising and leading demonstrations against the imperialist moves in the WTO concerning non-agricultural market access (NAMA) whereby the big monopoly finance bourgeoisie would call the shots all over the world, and the rest starve. See their explanation linked below. Three more COSATU Provincial Congresses will debate Fundamental Change this weekend. Democracy is alive and well among the working class. On July 24th at 18h00 the liberal Denis Beckett will lead a panel discussion on Constitution Hill. This, too, is a small part of democracy. See linked notice. Tomorrow (July 20th) at the same venue (as previously announced) COSATU GS Zwelinzima Vavi will be speaking at 18h00 at the same venue. Click on these links: Leila Khaled to meet COSATU, Invitation to the media (Notice) COSATU supports striking bus drivers (248 words) NUMSA plans marches over tariff reductions (661 words) Three more COSATU Provincial Congresses this weekend (182 words) State of the state panel discussion Con Hill 060719 (Notice)

Enough

“This society no longer recognizes any boundaries, geographical or moral”, wrote an Israeli about his fellow-colonists, quoted by Kathleen Christison in the article linked below. The horrible hypocrisy of the colonial Israeli warmongers and their imperialist supporters even gets noticed in the Johannesburg Business Day (see link). The knowledge of good and evil and the righteous rage against the racist destroyers is not much use. The enforcement of peace in this case needs huge masses of organised people. In London on Saturday there will be a march. It’s a start. Meanwhile, in South Africa, another kind of hypocrisy arises in the shape of the backward-looking pseudo-movement called Solidarity, small but in some ways similar to the Israeli colonialists. COSATU is not supporting them in their latest outburst. See link. The ANC-COSATU bilateral yesterday was not very exciting. See the link below for a very brief report. Political schools are to be part of the way forward. That can’t be bad. Within the South African Communist Party, a meeting of the SACP Gauteng Provincial Council at the weekend elected Zico Tamela, formerly Johannesburg District Chairperson, to be Chairperson of the Province. Jacob Mamobolo was elected to the position of Provincial Deputy Secretary. Additional Member positions will be filled later. Comrade Tamela is a founder member of the SACP Johannesburg Central Branch’s Communist University. Viva! In Mpumalanga the SACP Provincial Congress concluded successfully with a full and properly-elected leadership. See the linked item below. Click on these links: Insane Brutality of the State of Israel, Christison, Counterpunch (868 words) Dishonesty of language of terrorism, Crispin Hemson, Business Day (277 words) COSATU not supporting Solidarity (248 words) ANC-COSATU Bilateral 060717 (219 words) SACP Mpumalanga 6th Provincial Congress report (644 words)

Write, Act, Write

Ron Press is a poet (see the link below). His poem starts: “It is not genetic and not all Jews are affected.” Says Gilad Atzmon (see the second link): “Israel is a racially orientated democracy.” Atzmon is a musician and also the author of a novel called “A Guide to the Perplexed”. This title is borrowed from a work of the immortal Jewish philosopher, Moshe ben Maimon, called Maimonides, or by some “Rambam”, who was born 1135 in Moorish Spain. Gilad Atzmon was born in Israel and served in the Israeli military, but now lives in London. The Palestinians are going to free themselves, but who will save the Jews? Their noble heritage is not represented by colonial Israel. As before, it is to be found all over the world, but hardly in that colony, and least of all in the killer Israeli military forces. Gilad Atzmon seems to know why. Probably that is why he is in London, and not in his native Israel. Join the Palestine Solidarity Campaign at http://www.palestinecampaign.org/ . The visit of Jacob Zuma to Clive Derby-Lewis and Janus Walus, the jailed murderers of the late Chris Hani, is a mystery wrapped in an enigma (see the link below). At least it must be clear by now that we don’t know the whole story about the assassination plot and the killing. So why do some people, such as the Scorpions/NPA, not want that story to be investigated? Another poet is Jeremy Cronin, writing prose this time (see the linked article below), but giving us a poetic word: “metonymy”. We live and learn. Click on these links: Mashuganas, Ron Press (Poem) Echoes of the Wehrmacht, Gilad Atzmon, Counterpunch (1253 words) Zuma prison visit to Derby-Lewis and Walus, Monare, Sindy (909 words) Shifting discourse on racial identity, Jeremy Cronin, Sindy (1697 words)

Mobilise Mass Support

The SACP Johhannesburg Central Branch meets today at 10h00 in the SATAWU offices, 13th Floor, Old Mutual Building, 29 Kerk Street, between Harrison and Smit. This is the last BGM of the current term. The Annual General Meeting is scheduled for August 20th. A meeting between a ministerial delegation of the South African Government and a 60-strong delegation of SA Muslims on July 13th stated, inter alia, the following: “The government and the Muslim delegation unequivocally expressed their condemnation of the current Israeli military offensive both in Gaza and in Lebanon and called on organs of civil society in South Africa to mobilise mass support and solidarity for the Palestinian people.” See the linked document below. The only way to mobilise mass support is through mass democratic organisation. To enquire about joining the Palestine Solidarity Campaign send an e-mail to info@palestinecampaign.org . The SACP has responded to the vulgar brush-off that the ANC National Working Committee tried to give to the SACP discussion document on State Power last month. See the link below. SATAWU still has problems with certain employers in the security industry, even after the settlement of the recent three-month-long strike. These reactionaries are hanging back and playing for opportunities to turn the clock back. See the link below. A year ago it was difficult to find anything in the press that fully reflected the concerns of the majority of ANC supporters. But now, for example, articles in the Weekender by Karima Brown and Vukani Mde reflect what is happening much more closely, even if not perfectly. See the two linked articles below. COSATU’s economist Neva Makgetla, in a short but lucid article from Business Day, shows reasons why COSATU is looking for Possibilities for Fundamental Social Change. See the link below. Lastly there is an event on Constitution Hill at 17h00 on Wednesday. This will be a panel discussion on the “legacy of suffering”, with three listed speakers plus chairperson. Such an arrangement leaves only a fraction of the avaialble time for discussion on the floor. Hence it becomes like watching a TV chat show. The Con Hill event on the following day (Thursday, July 20th, 18h00) is more to the style of the Communist University (as well as taking place in our usual venue) with only one main speaker, namely COSATU GS Zwelinzima Vavi. See the link. Click on these links: SA Muslims not targeted by SA government, Pahad and Jeenah (388 words) SACP PB response to ANC NWC, leading NDR or managing capitalism (6626 words) SATAWU on Fidelity Springbok unilateral abuse (369 words) Calls for Hani, Mbeki probes test NPA, Brown and Mde, Weekender (769 words) Navigating the great divide, Brown and Mde, Weekender (1056 words) Import boom leaves poor in the dust, Makgetla, Business Day (718 words) Con Hill 060719 17h00, CSVR Legacy of suffering seminar, invite (Notice)

Join The Palestine Solidarity Campaign

It is shocking when police fire upon a demonstration in a legal strike and arrest 200 people. Yet somehow people regard this as normal in South Africa these days (see link below) Jews are supposed to be a light held up for the world, which is a wonderful thought, like the idea of “l’Ouverture” (Toussaint), or “Mwalimu” (Nyerere), meaning respectively the opener and the teacher. The Jews were all supposed to try to be like this: moral leaders for the world. In the colonial state of Israel, Jews have become monsters. Their killing has no limit. If “Western” public opinion should trouble them, they give the Palestinians a little food, the better to be able to kill them later on. Western opinion allows killing, but pictures of starvation are unacceptable. See the linked article. It cannot be normal or acceptable for such things to happen whether here or in China, for example. See the ITGLWF report linked below or go to their web site for reports from Nicaragua and other places. Of course comparisons are generally odious. None of this is acceptable, whether here in South Africa or anywhere. But right now the Israeli aggression is the worst thing happening. If you go to the web site of the Palestinian Solidarity Campaign you can actually join an organisation which is doing something political about what is happening. The SACP is sending a delegation to China – see the link below for details of this significant exchange. The Harold Wolpe Seminars are back at last. The next one is on August 2nd. The reformist political trajectory of this programme has not changed, however. Developmentalism is first and foremost a denial of class struggle. As such it is obscurantist. Class struggle is still, as it has always been, the motor of history. There is no development without winners and losers. The question is always, who are the losers, and who the winners? Professor Peter Evans wants the winners to be a priestly caste of elite “Castalian” bureaucrats. Of course this is an impossible outcome and its proposal will only serve the imperial monopoly finance bourgeoisie. Developmentalism is nothing more than anti-communism. It is a weapon against the working class. For the memory of the late Harold Wolpe, comrades should flock in numbers to oppose this ideological assault in his name. See the notice linked below. Click on these links: COSATU and CEPPWAWU condemn police action against demo (602 words) Israelis feed so as to continue to kill, Tanya Reinhart, Counterpunch (1208 words) SACP high level 85th Anniversary delegation to China (276 words) ITGLWF concern with factory in Guangdong, China (368 words) 17h15 060802, Con Hill, Developmental State, Wolpe Seminar (Notice)

Battle Lines

The Communist University gathers tonight at the Women’s Jail, 1 Kotze Street, Braamfontein, at 17h00 to debate “Dialectical Materialism” (using John Hoffman’s “Dialego” chapter “What is Dialectical Materialism?”) versus the critique of this formulation which claims that it is a bowdlerisation or vulgarisation of Karl Marx’s work promoted by Kautsky, Plekhanov and Stalin after Marx’s death (using Cyril Smith’s “How the Marxists Buried Marx”). We must practice to defend our arguments when they are pitted against opposing ideas in “real time”. Next week on July 21st we will gather again to discuss Frederick Engels’ “Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State” (see linked text below). SACCAWU is the main retail workers’ union in South Africa. It is affiliated to COSATU. It is shaping for a dispute with Shoprite Checkers, one of our biggest retail chains. See link below. Sean Muller is a young South African writer who had a thorough, concise and highly lucid piece published yesterday in the Business Day, on South African transport. He already and explicitly anticipates the impact of the SACP ’s forthcoming Red October campaign. See the link below. The USA is plotting aggression against Cuba and possibly at the same time, Venezuela. See the two different linked articles below, both from US on-line publications. Mr. Danger is at it again. Click on these links: Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, Engels, 1884 (8306 words) SACCAWU battle lines drawn with Shoprite Checkers (702 words) Revolution of wheeled variety needed, Sean Muller, Business Day (844 words) The sinister intent and new measures of the Bush Plan against Cuba (1948 words) Washington Plots Regime Change, Pertierra, Counterpunch (1507 words)

Truth Must Come Out

Seen out of the back of a moving car, things grow smaller until quite quickly a large building might be reduced to a speck, or become altogether invisible. Chris Hani was murdered at Easter time thirteen years ago, in 1993, but his image in the mind does not grow smaller. Even young people who could hardly have known about him when he was alive uphold his memory far above others. The SACP responded to the NPA/Scorpions’ opinion, disrespectfully issued through their media spin-doctor Makhosini Nkosi, to the effect that they would refuse to take the investigation of Comrade Chris’ death to its logical conclusion. See the linked News24 article, which is combined in one document with the SACP’s statement. The Zinedine Zidane and Marco Materrazzi story has more to it than a single head-butt. You can see the head-butt in a mini-video in the linked document below (courtesy of “Mortal Kombat”, wahtever that is). You can also read Dave Zirin’s reasons why he continues to wear his Zidane Jersey. Click on these links: Hani murder right-wing plot, News24, plus SACP statement (933 words) Confronting Racism Head On, Dave Zirin, Counterpunch (924 words)

Clearance

"How is anyone, including the president, “cleared” of wrongdoing without first being investigated?" This is the question asked by Karima Brown yesterday in the Business Day, following the NPA/Scorpions' announcement (by the unfortunate Makhosini Nkosi) that the President had been "cleared" although no investigation had taken place because it was not “warranted”. When an emperor has not clothes, and everybody knows, then there is nothing for him to do except run for cover. Poor Makhosini, who was once a small-time emperor of the airwaves, hasn’t got the message yet. His former colleagues in the press used to cut him a lot of slack, but no more. The game is up. The exposure is complete. See the linked article below. The SACP’s 6th Mpumalanga Provincial Congress is to take place at the weekend – see the linked notice. The SACP yesterday issued an important statement concerning the Sahrawi Republic. Western Sahara is the last colony in Africa that has not yet achieved territorial independence, thanks to the invasion and occupation of its land by neighbouring Morocco after the withdrawal of the previous colonial power, Spain. Zwelinzima Vavi, General Secretary of COSATU, will speak on Constitution Hill on Thursday, July 20th. Start time is 18h00 and the venue is our familiar Women’s Jail. An obituary was sent in. It is eloquent and strongly felt, and it is of a man, Prof Chachage, who believed in free universities and in popular liberation, and who was loved. The CU salutes such people. Click on these links: Cleared without being investigated, Karima Brown, Business Day (753 words) SACP Mpumalanga 6th Provincial Congress, 060714 (Notice) SACP statement on developments in Sahrawi Republic (281 words) Vavi, Trade Unions and Democracy, Con Hill 060720 (Notice) An Obituary - Prof Chachage (Notice)

Solidarity For Palestine

A media briefing on Palestine took place yesterday afternoon in COSATU House, Braamfontein. It was well attended. The French in Algeria used to call the kind of action the Israelis are engaged in “rattonade”. This is a term full of racism but is at least a lot more frank than the Israeli colonialists presently are about what they are doing. The Israelis have announced that their actions have no time limit. This much is true. The Israeli actions in Gaza and the West Bank are not “punishments”, collective or otherwise. Punishment in all cases has a limit. Even a death sentence is supposed to be a single and final act. The Israelis cannot stop. Even if they were to drive the all of the Palestinians completely away from their land in a second NAKBA, they would still be compelled to find further victims in Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, Iran and even further afield. The Israeli colonial state has no other basis than violent and continuous attack. While claiming eternal victimhood, it must victimise, and so it must have victims. It must always find more. The shining towers of Tel Aviv are soaked in blood. Blood is their nature, from which they cannot escape. Their only possible escape would be to peace, but the Zionist entity is incapable of peace. It is in a state of antagonistic contradiction. It must continue to defeat, or it will be defeated. There is nothing else in it. It is often said, and was said again yesterday, that the South African experience might help in Israel/Palestine. We know that colonialism is a relationship of violence that is only maintained by the conscious continuous application of otherwise arbitrary violence. Let there be no dilution of this understanding. The first condition of peace must be the utter defeat of colonialism. This is what we know. What we also know is that it is only a mass democratic movement, both inside the country and outside of it. It exists in Palestine. But if the international solidarity movement does not have a mass and democratic character it will fail to fulfill its part in the necessary anvil-and-hammer-of-peace combination. Yet there are no membership cards on offer, no constitution in view, nor any annual conference or AGM. This is not how it was with the Anti-Apartheid Movement. The AAM was democratic and open to all comers. Its badge was proudly worn by millions, and represented democratic membership and rights, and much more than identity or attitude. It was a token of personal agency. This, also, must not be forgotten. There has to be a mass, democratic movement of solidarity for Palestine, outside Palestine, if any political relief is to be given to the Palestinian people. Yet the illusion still persists that funded NGOs can somehow do the job, in a cheap-and-easy substitution for the difficulties of mass organisation and leadership. NGOs cannot do the job. For the sake of the Palestinian people the south Africans should be saying, from their own experience: you must make this solidarity movement democratic, comrades, or it won't work. Click on this link: Media Statement on Palestine (1643 words)

Scoundrel Time

The front-page article by Simpiwe Piliso of the Sunday Times about the increase in dollar millionaires in South Africa, linked below, is worth reading. It speaks for itself. There is no way to enhance it or summarise it. One must know this situation. The reporter has done a good job, and you will not read such an exposure every day in the bourgeois press. Read it for yourself, and know what is happening to this country. The formation of a black section of the big bourgeoisie is only part of this story, because the great majority of the new millionaires appearing are obviously still white. The answer is not to individualise more artificial black millionaires, but instead to further socialise both production and ownership of the means of production. As for the article on the ANC being a house divided, also linked below; it may be a little over-cooked. Of course the ANC is not a monolith. But what is wrong if branches “take matters into their own hands”? That’s what is called democracy. The reporters Mbhele and Malefane fail to note a very important thing about the Umrabulo article they make so much of in other ways. Namely, that the document proposes a procedure for managing succession that is outside the ANC constitution. That being the case, it is not surprising that Kgalema Motlanthe, the ANC Secretary-General and hence guardian of its constitution, insisted on attribution going to individuals, and not to the ANC as a whole. He had to do that. This article is notable in another way. It takes up a full page of the broadsheet Sunday Times, less the space taken by a quite large photograph and seven small display advertisements. It is an average kind of page. The article is nearly 3000 words long. This gives a good measure of how many words are available on such a page (approximately A2 size), and a baseline from which the number of words in an entire broadsheet newspaper could be calculated. It’s a pleasure and a privilege to be able to relay another of Ron Press’s poems again. Thank you, Comrade. These poems of Ron Press’s are like mental revolutionary half-bricks: handy and powerful. Click on these links: SA millionaire boom, Simpiwe Piliso, Sunday Times (874 words) House divided cripples ANC, Mbele and Malefane, Sunday Times (2887 words) Darkness, by Ron Press (Poem)

Marx V Marxists and other contradictions

A part of the Scottish people spoke Scots Gaelic in the past, and some still do. This language is related to the other Celtic languages of Brittany, Cornwall, Wales and Ireland. It was once also spoken by substantial numbers of Black Americans, as is recorded in a recent Counterpunch article where an eye-witness is quoted concerning the jazzman Dizzy Gillespie, thus: "Dizzy used to tell me tales of how the blacks near his home in Alabama and in the Carolinas had once spoken exclusively in Scots Gaelic.” Other Scots speak a language (“Broad Scots”) somewhat similar to English. The high point (c.1500) of the early literature in this language was the time of the “makars” (makers). These poets had a way of challenging each other to a contest called a “flyting”. The rivals had to compose their work on the spot and in the face of an opponent, who would then try to surpass the first one and dismiss his arguments in return, and so on. A famous example of this genre is “The Flyting of Dunbar and Kennedie”, being a competition between the poets William Dunbar and Walter Kennedy. When Clement Mokone proposed that the Johannesburg Communist University should discuss “dialectical materialism”, Dominic Tweedie proposed a flyting. Clement chose “Dialego” (John Hoffman) on “What is Dialectical Materialism” as his text, while Dominic has chosen “How the Marxists Buried Marx”, by Cyril Smith (see the links below for these two texts). This flyting will take place next Friday, July 14th, in the Women’s Jail, 1 Kotze Street, Constitution Hill at 17h00. Please come and join in. The town planners of Johannesburg seem to be nearly all white, of a certain age, and hostile to one another, but even more hostile to people they consider to be below their rank. Consequently their debates have been sterile for many years past. This circumstance has been a tragedy for those whose lives could have been relieved of burden, had the academics and professionals been concerned to illuminate rather than to obscure. See the link below for a rare article by Dr Glen Mills. It quotes the great John Turner, humane champion of the settling urban petty-bourgeoisie. The Communist University knows that Mills’ opponents are already sharpening knives to cut his article to pieces with. It would have been just the same had Mills quoted (contradicting Turner) Frederick Engels, the champion of the mobile urban proletariat. Such is the miserable, closed, static world of the Johannesburg planners. If one makes a move, the others rush to crush it. The Johannesburg YCL's study circle will meet at 11h00 on Sunday, July 9th, in the SATAWU offices, 13th floor, Old Mutual Building, 29 Kerk Street, between Harrison and Loveday to discuss excerpts from Lenin’s “Left-Wing Communism: an Infantile Disorder” Next week, presumably at the same time and place, our YCL will discuss Lenin’s 1923 “On Co-operation”. See the link below. Click on these links: Dialego, Chapter 2, What is Dialectical Materialism? John Hoffman, 1976 (4320 words) How the Marxists Buried Marx, Cyril Smith, 1998 (13629 words) Thinking out of the matchbox, Glen Mills, Business Day (1197 words) On Co-operation, Lenin, 1923 (2611 words)