Nzimande, Netshitenzhe, Manamela, Mbalula

It is undoubtedly part of the very definition of socialism that capitalism survives within it. When at last the capitalist and other exploiter classes have moved off the stage of history, leaving only the working proletariat, then at that stage we will also no longer have socialism. At that point we will have already passed out of socialism and arrived at communism - a society without class conflict. Under socialism there is still class contradiction. So, for example, SACP GS Dr Blade Nzimande, from Cuba, about Cuba, in the new Umsebenzi Online, writes of: “…a difficult dilemma between, on the one hand, the temptation to micro-manage every conceivable sector of the economy, including restaurants and other micro operations, thus dispersing the planning capacity of the state away from its overall developmental role, and, on the other hand, allowing the gradual growth and development of a (potentially reactionary) domestic bourgeoisie?” It is a question of which class is in charge. When the working class is in charge, it sets the limits of what the capitalists are allowed to do. ANC NEC member Joel Netshitenzhe is a guest in Umsebenzi Online this week. Writing in response to Cde Nzimande’s contribution in the previous edition, he asks, among other things: “…is the ANC expected to lie in ambush to expropriate the expropriators; when we seek to attract domestic and foreign investments and assure investors of a climate for their investments are we engaged in a hoax; in a small open economy linked to global markets, how else do we manage these challenges!” In Netshitenzhe’s idea of the National Democratic Revolution, neither the capitalist nor the working class is in charge. The “democratic state” (which is the creation and the possession of the ANC) is in charge, according to him. In the best interests of the poor and the black, everything possible must be done for the capitalist bosses. This is not a hoax, writes Netshitenzhe, because “The most an NDR can do is to reform the capitalist system to build a better life for all,” according to him. Read these views in Umsebenzi Online, linked below. We will continue to discuss the question of the NDR and socialism in plenary in the SACP Johannesburg Central Branch’s BGM on Sunday. YCLSA National Secretary Buti Manamela is also in Cuba with the SACP delegation. Writing from there, and reflecting on what he sees and what he recently has seen in the Eastern Cape, he keeps the matter down to simple things. The youth want simple things, he writes, such as jobs, water, shelter, education, healthcare and economic participation. The YCL is a materialist organisation. Read Cde Manamela’s article in the linked new edition of the YCL’s online publication “The Bottom Line”, which also contains a statement from YCL Spokesperson Castro Ngobese on the YCL‘s initiative in relation to school violence, and the Summit they are proposing, backed by SADTU, which it looks like is going to happen. This YCL means business – revolutionary business. ANCYL President Fikile Mbalula gets back to the NDR in the equivalent ANCYL publication, Hlomelang, also linked below. Echoing Cde Netshitenzhe, he writes that “the State… commands vast resources through the fiscus and public corporations which must be used to accumulate, utilize and allocate wealth in ways that facilitates growth and redistribution,” and that: “The festival of ideas goes on, let’s debate!” You can have a festival, while the ANC guides, and the capitalists are a motive force. Read it carefully, comrades. Click on these links: Umsebenzi Online, Vol 5, No. 67, 1 Nov 2006, (3005 words) Bottom Line, YCLSA, Issue 3, Vol 15, 1 November 2006 (1589 words) The NDR, soul of revolutionary struggle, Fikile Mbalula, Hlomelang (1666 words)